


If Ignorance Be Bliss

by seemyselfout



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Coming Out, Dirty Talk, Dom/sub Undertones, Drunk Sex, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Friends to Lovers, Harry does sexy karaoke, Harry flirts with anything that has a pulse, Jealous Harry, Jealous Louis, M/M, Masturbation, Overhearing Sex, Pole Dancing, Screenshots, Slow Burn, Spanking, Their dorms are next to each other and harry gets laid a lot, They flirt using historical references and I don't know how I've managed that, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-06 13:03:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 30,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15195356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seemyselfout/pseuds/seemyselfout
Summary: “Uhh” Louis hears first. Then the creaking. The fucking creaking of it all. The bed, which Louis knows is basically a glorified camp bed with its awkward wheels at the bottom and wooden board behind it, begins thudding. The banging is rhythmic, Louis can’t help imagining the poorly stifled moans of them both, Harry’s awkwardly lanky limbs and skinny hips jerking with about as much finesse as an eighteen year old can manage (read: not a lot). There is a moment where Louis is almost certain he hears Harry say“shhh, uhh, my roommate”and... The audacity of that. Louis is simply too outraged now to do anything, including get turned on, and simply waits until Harry’s stupid dick gives up (it sounded like she didn’t come -Ha,Louis thinks bitterly).Uni AU: Harry is too experienced, and Louis just wants to get to experience him.





	If Ignorance Be Bliss

**Author's Note:**

> Fuckkk, I can’t believe it’s over! This work literally exorcised me, and I am free. This fic is literally my child; I spent so long on it, I really hope you like it! Thank you to Beth for Beta-ing, I couldn’t have done it without your love and support! Even when I was sick of Harry and Louis’ shit in this fic, you encouraged me to keep going. For that, I am very thankful. 
> 
> Now, onto the trigger warnings: Harry is a bit problematic at times during this fic. He has issues with sex, relationships, and finding a balance of what is healthy sometimes. It is more implied than anything, but it makes up a large part of Harry, so I wanted to explain it. I didn’t want to write him perfect, or unblemished, or unproblematic, because to me, this character carried with him his burdens, and I thought it made him much more of a person than a storybook dream boy. So please don’t think that I, the author, always endorse what he says, or what some of the characters have said, I just honestly wanted to write it a somewhat accurate reflection of people that age group. Sadly, not all of them are #woke. 
> 
> There is a lot of English slang in this! Just the major ones, though:  
> ‘Pissed’ can sometimes mean ‘drunk’, as well as it’s ordinary meanings. ‘Fag’ is a common slang term for a cigarette in England. I think that’s it?
> 
> Disclaimers: I have no affiliation with the University of Surrey or the town of Guildford! Though they are both lovely places, my portrayal of them is purely for fictional purposes. I based the description of them both in this story on my own experience of University. I don’t own One Direction, or any of the people in this story. Those mentioned in the story are obviously not like this in real life!
> 
> Title taken from a gorgeous poem by Mary Havran, Ignorance Be Bliss. 
> 
>  If you like this work, please leave a comment so I know and feel free to share with others :) 
> 
> Final words: I regret everything, and I’m too old to be writing fic.

                                                           

  
  
  
It begins the day Louis moves into his tiny room in Richmond Halls of Residence, University of Surrey. He’d been put on the twelfth floor of this grey, towering mass of a building. _Most unfortunately,_ Louis notes a bit ruefully, if the pilgrimage up the stairs is anything to go by. However, he’s much too excited to care about this just yet. He’s twenty (a ‘mature student’ as Surrey calls him, which Louis thinks is a bit insulting), after taking a few years out to bum around with Zayn, learning to drive, working in retail and wondering what the fuck to do with OK-but-not-the-best A Level grades. After deciding that he could no longer live with his mum and stepdad his whole adult life, he put in an ad-hoc application to the University of Surrey, the furthest university he could think of, proper down South, expecting the worst but actually crying when his UCAS form was returned to him with an ‘unconditional offer’ to study English Language and Literature.  
  
His mum cried with him, not quite believing someone from their council estate neighbourhood would ever make it to university, being the first in his family and all that. Still, here he was. The cheapest accommodation was Richmond Halls, which was kind of perfect for Louis because it was so popular, and there were music rooms and a common room and its own library, and all the things that Louis was looking forward to; he imagined it would be like Hogwarts from the description online. Judging by the state and stench of the wanly lit staircase, however, he now did not think this wish would materialise.  
  
The University Residential Team had really done a spot-on job of omitting the worst of Richmond in the prospectus and adding a nice filter to the best parts. He hasn’t told his mum this, but it is classed as ‘LIT!!!’ by one user on StudentRoom, which Louis was sceptical about, if not intrigued.

So, Richmond it was, where Louis would spend his first year. He can picture it now: having mad kitchen parties, getting pissed on alcopops and too many shots, and actually getting pissed on (he’d read some stories, to his horror), making friends for life, having a dynamic sex life, perhaps a boyfriend, all whilst maintaining that perfect First Class degree. That was the plan, he thinks, excitedly skipping up the stairs. He knew that his age would benefit him, as he was always bossy and craving attention, finding that younger guys did tend to stick to him and follow his example.  
  
Louis runs up the stairs with a Tesco bag full of pyjamas and socks, leaving Jo to trail behind him with the more cumbersome lot and chatting to the other mums and dads. He bursts into his room, which was all his, except for a shared bathroom in the hallway that he was expected to share with some other guy, who he guessed hadn’t turned up yet, judging by the lack of products or personal garb in there. He supposes this was the closest that the English educational system would ever come to shared roommates, Louis sighs, dismissing the quintessential American movies he’d seen. A shared loo did not sound quite so glamorous. The room is narrow, enough room for a single bed, a bedside table, a wardrobe and desk, with a bit of pacing room that he supposes he could have friends from home pitch on if they ever came up. Stan and Zayn had promised to, but Louis found himself making the same promises when his mates left for university when they were all eighteen, yet he never did. He begins unpacking, waving goodbye to his mum and giving her a teary-eyed cuddle and kiss. _This is it_ , he thinks, kicking his suitcase under the bed when he can’t be arsed to unpack it anymore, and unleashing a bottle of Prosecco he’d brought with him as ammunition to force people to be friends with him. _This is where my life begins_. 

 

He’s tipsy, he decides at about 8pm that night, when most of his flat are around the long, plastic table in the kitchen. The kitchen is for sixteen people he read, but there’s only eight of them here, Louis notes, and then wonders where the hell the rest are. Some of them are discussing this too, like Alice and Jade down the end. They’re both quite pretty, with Alice being blonde and petite and Jade having long pop-star hair and a fantastic Geordie accent. He can’t quite remember what Alice studies, but he remembers Jade spoke about psychology so he assumes she’s going to be opinionated and interesting; they’ll get on fine. He reckons that Niall, the Irish guy from down the hall, fancies one or both of them, if his arms around the back of the girls’ chairs is any indication.  
  
Niall is Louis’ favourite by far at the moment, as they’ve both done two shots already and shared the majority of the prosecco after it was politely distributed in mugs (all except Liam, who cordially declined). He’s loud and easy to make fun of, but in a fun way, because he just laughs loudly and smacks Louis on the back, deflecting any offence. Then there’s Liam, a maths student he learns, who is fairly quiet but still contributes, speaking slowly in his calm Midlands drawl. There’s also Henry, who is an international student from Beijing. He leads most of the drinking games and appears to be entirely confident in his ability to _outdrink anyone in England_. Niall says he will fight him for the title, and so they try and outdrink each _other_ , which Louis thinks is a moot point because none of them are from England, thus the challenge not actually proving the title they are competing for. Louis doesn't mention this to them though; he finds it much more humourous to watch them race to drink a can of Strongbow, faces red, staring at each other like a Wild West movie.   
  
Finally, there’s Alex, a quiffed brown-haired boy from somewhere in Berkshire, all too posh but quite cute with his straight, freckled nose, deep eyes and stubble that's in its stages of awkward infancy. He’s complaining loudly to Harry on his right, about pouring too much Captain Morgans in his Coke. Harry, meanwhile, laughs politely, and grabs a straw from the middle of the table and begins mixing it for him to drink easier.

Harry’s the one who shares his toilet next to them both, he had learned a couple of hours ago, while Louis exited his room to put away his kitchen stuff which was all loaded in a box and bumped into a tall, sturdily-built man emerging from the toilet.

“Shit, sorry man,” Louis had said, looking up at this giant, who had swooped back, wavy hair and the faintest hint of stubble around his mouth; tiny pricks all too small to see unless someone were this close to him. Or were kissing him. Louis coughed. He was tall. Too tall, really, and Louis won’t admit to anyone that he had stood on the back of his shoes to elevate himself a bit when the kid wasn’t looking.

“No worries. You my toilet-buddy, then?” he asked, in a voice quite deep, slow, lethargic, which reacted with Louis’ stomach like Mentos dropped into Pepsi. And, if Louis were to wax philosophical, which he won’t, he feels this moment might be as pivotal to him as Socrates’ death to Plato. Except this guy is the Hemlock, with his plaid shirt, and lanky but _strong_ limbs, and… could Louis really be sharing a toilet with this dude for a whole year? Wouldn’t that entail many naked encounters, accidental or not? Louis hopes so.

“Don’t say it like that,” is all Louis said. “Sounds perverted.”

The other guy laughed anyway, with a row of neat white teeth, sticking out a hand before awkwardly retracting it, realising Louis’ hands were occupied. “Sorry,” he apologised, though Louis’s not entirely sure for what. “Er, I’m Harry.”

Louis smiled at him, meeting his eyes this time and then flicking them back to the ground, because this guy’s stare had Louis wanting to run away and hide, the conflict of always and yet never wanting the attention of this man burned in his conscience.  
  
“Louis," Louis had smiled faintly, "I’m just gonna-” he said, mimicking with his head to the kitchen and walked off, perhaps a bit rudely, but he was a bit stuck for words and needed some time to come to terms with the appearance of his neighbour.

 _Bloody hell_ , Louis thought, stuffing plates and pans into a cupboard absentmindedly, grateful for the sanctuary away from him. Harry was _hot_.

 

Now, it’s 2am, and they are all _smashed_. Louis had been waiting years to finally experience the Freshers' lifestyle he has seen so highly publicised on his Facebook, and now, stumbling down the Guildford high street, he was. Louis is probably the most sober of the lot, but even he hasn’t been this drunk in months. They’d all gone out to Casa, a club a few blocks’ walk from their accommodation, which has a student night every Monday, and left Louis out of pocket ( _was everything this expensive down South_ , he pondered hazily) and grossly intoxicated. The night was incredible, the atmosphere buzzing with nerves, a sense of belonging, and the clubs surging with new students and offering Jager Bombs as two-for-ones.  
  
Harry, not to Louis’ surprise, gets quite a bit of attention wherever he goes, from both boys and girls, which he laps up, dancing with everyone and letting people put their hands on his waist, or on the side of his face, or neck, everyone swept away in the feeling of _this is the beginning, this is the start of my new life_.  
  
The music is live, poppy and upbeat, something on the Top 40 that Louis heard in the car on his way down to Surrey that morning. Everyone touching Harry, it reminds Louis of the parable of Jesus healing the lepers, as Harry closes his eyes and lets anyone feel him, a strand of wet hair hanging limply over one eye. Louis thinks he still looks unfairly handsome. He is by far the most personable person he’s ever met, dancing with everyone: first he dances with Alex, and quickly recognises that Alex is not the kind of person who welcomes close bodily contact with other men. Sensing this, the two instead perform an awkward kind of dance that Louis had seen countless other teenage boys do where they finger point in the air, and to each other. He also picks up Alice by her waist and spins her around, her legs flailing off the ground and her blonde hair bouncing as she giggles, tiny body completely engulfed by his arms.  
  
Harry spots Louis in the crowd, and grabs his hands as the song changes, setting Alice down carefully and bringing Louis in close until their chests bump. Louis lets out an _oof_ and suddenly they’re in a kind of hug, and Harry moves Louis’ hands onto his hips. Louis glances up, shocked as he doesn’t know many heterosexual men who would offer to be this close and dancing on him, not without realising the connotations, before realising Harry doesn’t actually _know_ he’s gay, no one here does.  
  
Harry looks totally at ease though, body moving immodestly to the music as he places his own hands at the small of Louis’ back, grasping onto the fabric there, looking the epitome of self-indulgent, getting lost in the words of the music. Harry’s body feels lean under the denim, hard and warm from all the body heat in the room. It's only friendly, he knows, he's seen Harry dance with everyone, but Harry looks down at him, dark hair sweaty and his face sheen, as he smirks at Louis, eyes glinting, and Louis can't help but drunkenly wish he were even a little bit gay.  
  
Just then, Harry gets dragged away by a group he met earlier, who signal with their index finger and thumb the universal sign for shots. Harry goes willingly, being pulled along by the collar of his shirt. Louis watches him go, stumbling, smacking Niall on the bum as he does so, who had begun dancing rather closely with Alice. Louis can’t imagine being that comfortable under strangers’ ministrations. He tracks Harry’s movement with his eyes as he makes his way along the club to the bar, limbs loose with alcohol. He’s being stopped, his back to Louis so the latter can’t see properly, but he notices Harry soon stooped over, and assumes he’s kissing someone. Louis turns around and grabs Jade’s hands, pulling her to the middle of the crowd and dancing to Taylor Swift singing about how she feels twenty-two.  
  
  
  
As the night draws to a close, they trickle out of the club, Alice and Niall walking a few paces ahead and holding hands, Alice only just the height of Louis’ shoulders with these staggering heels on. Louis and Jade follow behind and are honestly rooting for, even at this early stage, Niall and Alice because Louis lives for gossip if nothing else.  
  
Jade heckled a “Flatcest is a sin!” and “Hashtag Nalice!”, giving an ingenious smile afterwards and begins to hum _My Heart Will Go On_ , and Louis starts belting it, and then Harry does too, from where he’s walking behind with Alex and Liam. He’s kind of shouting it though, but it’s pretty fucking good, and Louis can’t help but let out a laugh, genuinely impressed.   

Alex is talking to Harry and Liam about this girl Harry had pulled in the smokers’ area at Casa; a slim girl, maybe Louis’ age, with ginger hair and strong eyeliner with a bold red lip. Louis didn’t think much of her, instead turning to the guys next to them and starting a conversation, but he knows Harry bought her a drink.  
  
They see Niall pull Alice into the 24/7 Subway, muttering something about a _BLT,_ and _A Hangover Preventer_ , and _I’ve only got two quid but we got a voucher in our Freshers’ pack and if they’ve given me an out of date coupon I will throttle them_. Alice giggles uproariously, and Niall positively glows. Right then.

So then it’s Jade and Louis, arm in arm, and the boys just behind, but it’s doing absolutely nothing to prevent Louis hearing all the extraneous details of Harry pulling this girl. Jade seems to also have managed to master the art of sleepwalking, as she leans against Louis’ arm with her eyes closed, letting Louis guide the way softly down the kerbs and across the roads at night.

“She were right fit, weren’t she?” Harry says, in his Mancunian accent, voice rough from shouting the lyrics to literally everyone in the club with his hands up and jumping. His Northerness, not quite like Louis’, is intensified since he’s absolutely sloshed. Louis can almost _hear_ Alex nod fervently, enthusiastically, saying how if Harry hadn’t made a move, Alex would’ve tried his luck also. Louis wonders absentmindedly whether the girl even would fancy Alex, but he doesn’t want to kill the mood of ignorant eighteen-year-olds.  

“Did you get her number?” Liam asks, and Louis hears them stop to light a cigarette.

“Yeah,” Harry says after a beat, puffing out smoke, which billows into Louis' path. Louis smells the smoke carried in the September wind. “She gave it to me before we went downstairs. Think she’s actually doing Business, which will mean we share a Law class together, I think.”

“Nice one, bro. I’m jealous-” Alex continues, then starts saying if they’d only stayed there later, only for a few more songs, then he _definitely would have gone up to the blonde making eyes at him in the R &B room_. Louis rolls his eyes. He looks to his right and nudges Jade, who is nodding her head with every step she takes, having gone quiet since Alice and Niall left them.

“You alright, darling?” Louis asks softly, just for her, and leans over to pat a kiss to the side of her sleepy head, his drunken mind being entirely reminded of his sisters. She looks up at him and smiles, squeezing his bicep reassuringly.

“Oi, oi Louis! Get in there mate.” Alex chants obnoxiously into his left ear, smoke blown into his face, and laughs when Jade musters the energy to flip him off. _Barking up the wrong tree,_ Louis thinks, slightly amused.

They reach the campus within five minutes, shoving fobs onto the door keypad for their block, and Louis is slightly disappointed to have survived his first night of Freshers without going home with someone. The thing is, he isn’t quite sure if he wants to tell everyone he’s gay yet, and he’s especially trepidatious to tell the lads, as they could be pricks about it. He helps Jade get to bed and gives her a glass of tap water from her and Alice’s shared bathroom, rolling her onto her side. _Teenagers_ , he sniffs, chuckling. _Can’t handle their drink_. 

He drunkenly thumbs a message to his mum, who had asked him hours ago how he was settling in. He also scrolls through a group chat from home, seeing what Zayn and Stan are up to. It makes his heart ache a little bit, too sentimental from all the shots. He thinks it’s so weird how only this morning he was back in Yorkshire. He sits down in their kitchen under the yellow light, and puts a fuck-load of chicken nuggets into the oven that he’d picked up during his Tesco Express trip with everyone earlier on. He didn’t have time to eat at all during the evening either, simply because he was too excited to do something boring like cook and Niall was also shoving prosecco down his throat. Whilst he’s waiting for the oven’s alarm to go off and he’s rooting through everyone’s cupboards to try and find ketchup (he’d forgot to buy it), he hears Niall and Alice come through the door of their flat from the stairwell. As he listens closer, he only hears one door shut, though. Hm. Interesting.

He plates himself up when it’s done and takes it into his room, not wanting to encounter any of the Mystical Eight students which he has never seen, and simply puts it down to a different body clock. He also doesn’t want to bump into Henry, who was drunkenly told to go home by the bouncers before he even made it into the club. As Louis and Liam were walking him round the corner back to the university, Henry attempted to piss into the River Wey, but forgot to pull his boxers down and subsequently wet himself. It was awkward for all involved.

As Louis’s settling into bed with his plate, he hears a murmur from the right side of his room, right next to his head, and he stills. It’s murmuring, _loud_ murmuring, and it’s obviously drunken as Louis can hear the slurs through the thin walls. He knows Harry occupies the room to his right, as he shares the bathroom which resides in the middle of the two rooms shallowly, only accessible through the hallway with their fob key. Louis quickly looks at his phone: nearly 3am. _What the hell is Harry doing up at-_

And then Louis hears it. Very quiet, faint, two raps on Harry’s door. He hears the door open, then a female voice, only identifiable by the tone. He hears a bottle clink on the bedside table loudly, and a small giggle from one of them, or both. He doesn’t know. Another laugh. Then he hears the bed creak with weight.

Louis gulps, and hopes he has not just landed a fucking loud-sex-roommate. No. No, he refuses to. He holds his breath, unsure whether to listen and investigate or just put his headphones in and hope for the best. Louis _specifically_ wrote on the accommodation forms that the University of Surrey asked him to fill out that he was a hard studier when it came to exam period, and he will be bloody well _damned_ if Harry stupid Styles thinks he can jeopardise his grades all because of -

“ _Uh”_ Louis hears first. Then the creaking. The fucking creaking of it all. The bed, which Louis knows is basically a glorified camp bed with its awkward wheels at the bottom and wooden board behind it, begins thudding. The banging is rhythmic, Louis can’t help imagining the poorly stifled moans of them both, Harry’s awkwardly lanky limbs and skinny hips jerking with about as much finesse as an eighteen year old can manage (read: not a lot). There is a moment where Louis is almost certain he hears Harry say “ _shhh, uhh, my roommate”_ and. The fucking audacity of that. Louis is simply too outraged now to do anything, including get turned on, and simply waits until Harry’s stupid dick gives up (it sounded like she didn’t come - _Ha,_ Louis thinks bitterly _)_. He turns off the light, and the alcohol soaks up any dreams he may have had.

 

Louis wakes up the next day, light beaming in through the gaps where the curtains don’t quite cross, luckily escaping a hangover but not quite the grogginess that accompanies it. He is desperate for a piss and a cup of tea, so eventually drags himself to the hallway, hoping not to encounter anyone with just his stripy shirt and boxers on.

He grabs the toilet door handle, but not before it is tugged open before his eyes, and Harry is there, in all his shirtless glory, chest wet and glistening. Louis smacks his chest out of instinct, letting out a scream, a _scream_ , alongside a “yer bastard, you _scared_ me!” and Harry lets out an obnoxious laugh, and adjusts the towel slung lowly on his hips. Louis can’t help but notice the V-line that emerges from the cloth, the rudiments of hair from his navel, down.

“Soz, mate,” Harry says, flashing him a grin (who actually uses abbreviations in everyday speech? The linguist in Louis dies) and squeezes his arm firmly when he walks past him, padding back into his own room. Louis does not move for about ten seconds after; simply looks into the abyss of the steamy bathroom, blinking and feeling the burn of Harry’s hand on his arm.

Louis breathes, willing himself not to fancy his bloody roommate. He’d done it before with Zayn, in the first few months they met, and fell for his gorgeous caramel skin and eyes, before realising that Zayn was actually kind of gross when you got to know him and he definitely did not want to suck his dick. Still, Louis loves the chase of a straight boy, but it never leads to anything, and Louis is getting frustrated. Maybe he should join the Surrey LGBTQ+ society; he bets he could find a few dates there. 

He eventually manages a quick shower and heads into the kitchen, seeing Niall on the way out with a pack of Jaffa Cakes in hand. Louis waggles his eyebrows at him in silent reference to Alice. Niall laughs, shaking his head before retreating to his room. Louis thinks it’s ridiculously cute.

Of all the sights Louis does _not_ expect to see in the flat kitchen, at the top is Henry sitting at the white table reading a leaflet a student rep had left with a cup of tea, looking like a domestic goddess, alongside Harry and… the red-haired girl from Casa. _Aha, the owner of the mystery moans_ , Louis thinks.  
  
She looks much plainer without her make-up on, Louis thinks. Harry, most unfortunately, looks as gorgeous as ever, his hair looking soft from where it’s just been washed, clothed in a fluffy navy dressing gown, his eyes bright in contrast to his natural summer tan. They are all getting on fine, and Harry and she are sharing a plate of Marmite on toast, laughing like children at something Louis didn't hear, and it’s… kind of annoying? Like, they've  _just_ met. But Louis doesn’t know why he's irked, except maybe because they kept him up last night and have no humility or shame, judging by the way they greet Louis with a smile, like Louis didn't hear them both going at it last night. Harry even musters a “hey, Lou” with his filthy mouth that got up to God knows what yesterday, and Louis was subject to the fucking audiobook version of it.

“Alright,” he mumbles, grabbing a bowl from the pack of cornflakes that the university provided free when they moved in and making himself a cup of tea. The ginger girl eventually goes back to her own halls, but doesn’t kiss Harry goodbye or anything, and it’s all very jovial.  
  
Harry does get the shit ripped out of him by Henry and Alex when she leaves though, and Louis gets to hear Harry’s recap of the event in exceptional detail, as if Louis had not been separated by a thin wall.

 “Shut up, you didn’t!” Alex shouts, and did he really have to be so loud all the time? “You fucked her on your desk?” Alex for some reason finds this hilarious, clapping his hands over his mouth, like no one's ever done doggy before. They're all sitting in the kitchen around lunch time, lessons having not yet begun, so they spend the day together. Unfortunately for Louis, this means quizzing Harry on what he got up to last night. Louis shifts in his seat, eager to end this conversation because it's like these people have never heard of sex before. 

“Yeah man, it was some nasty shit.” Harry laughs, putting his hands behind his head, stretching his back on the chair. Louis knows that did, in fact, not happen, as the desk is also the same side as the bed, and they weren’t exactly quiet last night. Louis doesn’t say this, but he narrows his eyes at Harry, and hopes Harry feels some inner gnawing feeling that he is lying.

“That’s mad, mate. You got so lucky last night! I’ve messaged a few girls on Tinder this morning actually.”

“Oh yeah?” Harry asks, eyebrows raised, but he’s messaging on his phone now. Alex goes into elaborate detail of this girl he is messaging, and the way he speaks of her is actually quite sweet, and Louis thinks if anyone can release Alex’s palpable sexual frustration, then Louis is a friend of theirs.

Eventually, Liam, Alice, Jade and Niall come to join them for breakfast, the Mystical Eight being nowhere in sight, except for an international student named Arj, who comes in to cook, but promptly leaves, perhaps unnerved by the sixteen eyes staring at him in disbelieving silence. That provides enough conversation to change the subject and conspiracies about the Eight pervade throughout the entire group for the morning, making up personalities and scenarios as to where all the rest are. Louis laughs at the most outrageous, grateful for the change of agenda, sipping on his second cup of coffee. He loves uni.

 

Louis _detests_ uni. After they’d all nipped to the society’s fair in the main campus then into the student pub for a few beers for the rest of the evening, they returned home and went their separate ways. Louis had planned on starting to read this Chomsky book he saw the Language Society recommending, and had just settled down in bed when he heard it, _again_. It must be Ginger. And that was actually her name, you know - _Ginger._ It’s like Harry paid for it. (“Her name is Ginger… and she has red hair. How cool is that?” Harry asked the previous evening. “Very cool,” Louis said, just an edge too sarcastic that Louis isn’t certain he got away with, but Harry didn’t seem to notice anyway, texting away and happily humming _I Got You, Babe_.)

Knock. Answer. Giggle. Bottle. Bedside Table. Bed. Creak. Thud, thud. _Oh_. _Ah_. Silence.

Just like yesterday. Except, yesterday they were both very drunk, and this time only partially drunk, and so the moves were more calculated, and thus the banging louder, and trust Louis when he says that she _definitely_ came this time, if the thud to the right side of Louis’ head where he lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, is anything to go by. Louis can only imagine what the fuck is happening. It’s still mostly Ginger that Louis can hear, voice high pitched and staccato. Harry must have more vocal control. Louis tries to think about the linguistic importance of communication during sex, as some sort of distraction.  
  
When it is all over, and Louis is finally safe, he chucks a glance to his bedside table, where Chomsky’s sad face looks at him with disappointment.

“Tomorrow,” Louis says, and switches off his bedside lamp.

 

Eventually, lectures start and the group don’t see each other as much. Of course, they all still get drunk every Monday for student night at Casa, and Wednesday, for Student Union Karaoke, and Saturday because it’s a weekend, and they also eat dinner together round about the same time in the kitchen, but other than that, they kind of get on with their own thing. Louis has received his first reading assignments, and even this early on he feels overwhelmed. He has also asked to be events coordinator of Language Society, which basically involves arranging piss-ups that are language-themed: two of Louis’ favourite things. 

As well as academic changes, there are also good personal changes: Liam has come more out of his shell, bonding a lot with Henry over computing and releasing their inner geeks, leading to Henry sometimes bringing his laptop into the kitchen and them all playing Mortal Kombat using XBox Controllers.  
  
Harry is rubbish at it, and Louis spends the whole time pulling faces at him from across the table so that Harry would lose _really_ badly with added distraction. (“Oi!” Harry had whined. “Cheater.” He said, folding his arms, looking ever the petulant toddler. Louis pinched his cheek. “Shut it, Harold Hardrada, or I won’t flush next time we order a Dominos”, and Harry tried to stay serious, before he spluttered, hitting away Louis' hand. "Gross.").  
  
Alice and Jade have become close, and Alice and Niall are still sleeping with each other and still acting like none of the flat know. Alex has also begun spending time with Louise, the girl from Tinder that the flat met in the second week; a sweet, funny girl who’s in Louis’ Literature seminar. Louis and Louise got along well, as she was also a couple of years older than the others and loves to bitch, like Louis. As Alex had spent more time with her, this had the effect of making Alex less of an ass-kisser of Harry’s, which had the effect of lowering Louis’ irritation levels dramatically.

But for Harry, not much had changed at all. Louis still saw him usually every morning, getting ready for a 10am lecture, him emerging clean from the bathroom, smelling incredible, looking incredible, giving Louis a friendly wink, or grin, but Louis knew what it meant. No one took as many showers as Harry Styles in Flat 28, Richmond Halls, University of Surrey. That was because no one had quite so much sex as Harry Styles, Flat 28, Richmond Halls, University of Surrey. Nearly every night for the past two weeks, Louis had been kept up by the ruckus. It must be… exhausting. The same old routine. Louis wondered how on Earth Harry got any work done, and how on God’s good Earth he would pass his January Law exams.  
  
Even when Harry stops seeing Ginger (which has absolutely no effect on Harry’s emotional state whatsoever, may Louis add, and he didn't mention it at all, she just wasn't there one night), the noise only stops for two days. These are the clearest, more tranquil two days of Louis’ life. He even gets a 76% on an essay he completed in those two days.  
  
Then, Sarah comes along. Sarah is a nursing student, has back-length brown hair, skin like salted caramel and incredibly leggy. Sarah is much louder than Ginger too, and when drunk she _screams_. Harry, it sounds, _really_ likes Sarah. He remembers one night, Jade and Alice running to Louis’ door in a fit of giggles at 2am, them being the other side and the room opposite of Harry’s, respectively. They all sat huddled together in Louis’ bed and laughed at how dramatic Sarah was being. “No one is _that_ good,” Alice whispered, lips muffled by Louis’ duvet. Louis nods his head. Indeed.  
  
Still, when she was loud, Harry was _also_ loud. This is when Louis began hearing Harry, too. Harry would start grunting, these deep _urghgh_ and _fuuuuuuck_ s and _ahh, yeaaah_ that went on forever. He moans like he talks, throaty and gravelly and slow. He once heard Harry grit out a _yeaaah, give it to me_ and Louis’ face paled. “What’s he being given?” Louis whispered to himself, mouth agape.  
  
It makes Louis curious: who the fuck _was_ this Harry behind closed doors? This sweet boy with his broad chest who Louis catches eating cereal at night in his pyjamas, is shit at XBox and drinks Rum and Coke? _And_ , Louis thinks, _if I am attracted to the nice, innocent Harry, how the hell do I correlate that version of him with this… sexual deviant_ ? _Harry.exe?_ Louis lies in bed most nights, Harry’s headboard tapping some kind of morse code out, and genuinely wonders if this constitutes a threesome.

Also, the banging on the desk turns out to not be confined to Harry’s over-active sexual imagination. Louis found out the hard way. He was handwriting his essay on Saussure’s theory of semiology, when his books on the upper shelf started lurching forwards incrementally and his tea started quaking, like a scene from Jurassic Park. Then came Sarah, with her high-pitched constant string of ‘ _uh-uh-uh-uh-uh’_ and ‘ _Harry-Harry-Harry’_ , along with a few audible slaps, and _yep, that’s it_ , Louis decided, resolutely. Enough was enough. He stuffed his earphones into his ear, jumped into bed, willed his hard-on to go down and decided he would have to put an end to this somehow.

 

They go out Saturday to Pop!, a club in Guildford centre that’s far too cheesy for anyone’s actual taste in music but also definitely the best night out in Surrey. Louis can’t wait. He ends his final seminar at 6, and immediately begins getting ready, resolute to pull tonight. He cannot stand the thought of having to hear anymore of Harry having sex, as he thinks he has been hard for the last three weeks and has a serious case of built-up frustration. That, coupled with seeing him every morning in various states of undress and sopping wet, is killing him. The thing is, Louis wants to wank, he _really_ wants to wank, but if he wanks he’ll feel guilty knowing that it’s because of his - kind of - roommate getting off with someone else, and Louis will feel like too much of a creep. 

So instead, Louis will hit two birds with one stone: get off with some guy hopefully, and give Harry a taste of his own medicine. Louis styles his hair into a textured fringe with some hair gum, hoping that it won’t fall flat from sweat half way into the night. He douses himself in aftershave, putting on some tight black trousers to accentuate his ass and a fitting navy button up, alongside a dark grey blazer with navy thread through it. Louis feels fucking good, and he is a few glasses of wine down, so his confidence levels are peak. Southern boy, here he comes.

He meets Jade in the kitchen, looking gorgeous in a sparkly purple bodycon dress playing Ring of Fire with Alex, Louise, Liam, and Henry. Harry soon comes in with a bottle of pink Gordon’s gin in hand and playing Cage the Elephant on a hand-held speaker. He’s donned in a black mesh vest and leather pants. He enters like he isn't dressed like a wet dream. Louis chokes a bit on the wine he is drinking, earning himself a raised eyebrow from Jade. He thinks he might visibly be drooling, staring at the way Harry’s tanned torso is perfectly hinted at in the vest. Does he have no shame? Luckily, Alex speaks up to normalise the situation.

“Harry, you total slut, why are you dressed like that?” he teases and Jade howls.

Harry just winks at him and says “We’re going to Pop!, Alex, mate. This place is where YMCA and mesh vests are born.”

"Leave some girls for us, mate," Liam whines. 

Louis snorts at that. "It's not gonna be girls he's pulling in that outfit," and everyone laughs. 

"Leave me alone," Harry says, laughing bashfully. He glances over to Louis then, standing by the fridge, still staring at Harry. Harry gives him a quick once over. “You look good,” he says to Louis, and it’s not said with any particular weight, or importance, or meaning, but dear Lord, Louis’ ‘I-want-to-chase-straight-boys’ monitor is practically flat-lining, so who can blame him when he nearly hyperventilates.

Louis does not have time to thank him, instead watches his arse retreat in those leather pants, taking a seat by Jade and smiling, kissing her on the cheek and she cuddles into him and then tells Alex to take his go. Alice teeters in later in a tiny, blue two-piece skirt and crop, and Louis whistles. He thinks Niall will die and go to heaven when he sees her.

“Alice, you beauty!” he exclaims, taking her hand from where he’s stood and leading her to the table. Alice beams.

“Thank you, Lou-Lou. You are looking particularly delectable yourself,” she winks.

“All the better to snatch up a nice boy with-” and the table falls silent. Fuck. What the hell had Louis done? He had admitted he liked boys, with everyone around, including Louise, who might tell people in his class. Alex, who he couldn’t meet eyes with, had put his finger down slowly, after raising it for the _seven is heaven_ rule. The music still rang through the tinny speaker, held by Harry.

Harry.

What would Harry think, knowing that all those times he had come from the shower, Louis had been mentally undressing him further in his mind? Or that each touch or tease, or near-naked bathroom encounters meant something a bit more to Louis? Fuck, he couldn’t think.

“Boy?” Alex asks, first, nervously laughing.

He chances a look to Jade, who’s smiling, and he feels warmer. “I knew it!” she yelps to Alice, and they both laugh loudly. “No offence, Lou, but it’s a bit obvious!” Louis is a little bit offended but mostly just lets out a sigh of relief. He doesn’t really care what the boys think, as long as the girls are nice about it, as he is closest with them, Though he thinks he will have to tell Niall when he arrives before it gets to him through someone else.

The noise level goes back to normal, everyone continuing the game, and Louis pulls a jack and has to deposit some of his wine into the dirty pint. As he leans over, he chances a look at Harry, who had been a bit quiet.

But Harry is boring a hole in the table with his eyes, biting his bottom lips.

“You alright, pet?” Jade asks from beside him, rubbing his leg. Harry immediately smiles, and draws his gaze to her.

“Fine,” he grins, a bit off-tune, and looks at Louis where he’s just finished pouring. “All good.”

 

The night, Louis thinks, is a massive success. Now the secret is out, he doesn’t have too much trouble letting loose and being a lot more flirty than he has the previous weeks in clubs. He even dances with Niall quite seductively, and Niall gives it right back, and soon they are both slut-dropping in the middle of Pop! and the group has formed a circle around them clapping and whooping.  
  
It gets too hot, them all crowded and jumping up and down, so he follows Alex, Harry and Liam to the smoking area, whilst the girls, Henry and Niall decide to get more drinks. The two boys are sharing a cigarette, and Louis decides he quite fancies one himself, his being drunk always making him crave smoking. 

Instead of asking the boys though, he scours the smoking area, and his gaze zeros in on a guy standing alone, phone casting a blue light on his handsome profile and blowing out smoke.

“’M gonna go ask him for a smoke” Louis says whilst the boys are chatting, patting Alex on the back as he nudges past his group of lads. They all look at who Louis is referencing, and Liam and Alex start sending him up, wolf-whistling and saying ‘get in there, boy’ and ‘go get some’.

Harry grabs onto his bicep with a big hand, causing him to stop. “I’ve got one Lou, you don’t have to go over there,” Harry says, offering one outright. His eyes are big, sincere. Louis does consider staying but then Alex slaps Harry’s hand away.

“Er, _yes he_ _does_ , you massive cockblock.” Louis laughs and makes his way over.

“Hey,” Louis says, sidling up to him. The guy looks up at Louis. He’s got sandy blonde hair under the club’s outside lighting, and dark eyes a colour Louis can’t quite pinpoint yet. He has a bit of stubble lining his jaw, a full top lip, and Louis thinks he’s exactly his type. He’s not overly good looking, not like he thinks Harry or Zayn are, but he is handsomely-attainable.

“Alright?” the guy asks, smiling and flashing a row of the most beautiful teeth Louis has ever seen.

“Fine,” he says, coming a bit closer. “Don’t reckon I could nick a fag off you, do ya? Seem to have run out.” Louis’s pulling all of his moves on him, like lowering his voice and putting on his accent thick as it’s already 1am and Louis really, _really_ doesn’t want to go home alone tonight.

“Yeah, sure” he complies, digging out a crumpled pack of Mayfair from his pocket. Louis thinks that no straight man would smoke a Mayfair in public, and flicks his eyes quickly to the sky to thank God for sending him these signs.

Louis finds out his name is Matt, and though he studies History, he is actually in the Language Society, and they get chatting about their favourite books, the upcoming pub crawl which Louis is arranging, and their hatred for people on Facebook who mix up of _their, there_ and _they’re_. Louis thinks he has met his actual soulmate, who is well-versed in grammatical etiquette. Furthermore, every time Matt laughs, he leans forward and rests his forehead on Louis’, Louis smelling the cheap Sourz on his breath. Louis leans in to laugh with him, and he definitely is taking this to mean Matt is either _very_ tactile, or not straight, which Louis interprets to be the latter.

“Who you here with, then?” Matt asks, after they’ve finished smoking and are enjoying the cooler air from being inside the stuffy club. They’re still standing close enough to know something’s going to happen tonight, and Louis’s got his index finger in the belt loop of Matt’s jeans.

“Just some of my flat mates,” Louis says, and throws a glance over his shoulder to look to see if they’re still there. They are, in fact, with Liam and Alex trying to give each other a smiley face with the lighter and kicking each other when they get close enough to do it.  
  
Harry is also there, but not involved with what the other boys are doing. Instead, he is crossed-armed in his vest, cigarette forgotten in one hand, looking directly Louis’ way, with his brows drawn down contemplatively, chewing on the inside of his cheek. When he meets Louis’ eyes though, he doesn’t look away. Louis scowls and wonders what his problem is, feeling that ever since he came out to them, Harry’s been off.  
  
Matt seems to have clocked the encounter, too. “That guy seems to be interested,” is all Matt remarks lightly, and Louis could almost burst out laughing with the irony of it. 

“He’s straight,” Louis says, and Matt breathes out a ‘good’. Louis catches Matt’s lips in his, not caring if Harry has seen.

Louis ends up bringing Matt to their flat that night, leaving the club about twenty minutes after everyone else leaves. The more he talks to Matt though, the more he is not considering sleeping with him tonight, because they just get on so well. Louis kind of doesn’t want to ruin anything, and Matt has already agreed to come to Karaoke next week with the flat after Louis invited him, and also the Language pub crawl. Does he really want to ruin his chances of something nice? They do kiss more though, affirming Louis’ suspicions he is indeed not straight and definitely interested, if the weight pressed into his thigh is anything to go by. They fall asleep in Louis’ bed with clothes on, Louis being held by him, and Louis thinks that university has finally brought him a promising love life.

They see each other once before karaoke, when Matt comes to the flat and Louis cooks dinner for them both. He and Harry were the only two around in the afternoon, Louis having no classes after lunch and Harry missing his, and so they went to Tesco to get the ingredients, walking across the motorway bridge and into town.

“So, finally get some then, Tomo?” Harry asks out of nowhere, and Louis thinks he tries to come across as casual but it sounds forced. Why Harry is interested in nitty gritty details of the sex is beyond Louis. Alas, nothing did happen, but he doesn’t know if he wants Harry to know that.

“Maybe.” Louis says haughtily, and Harry extends his arm, lightly hitting Louis in the side.

“Oh, c’mon, tell!” Pries Harry, and when Louis shakes his head again, he says, with his chin jutted “well, I didn’t hear anything so I bet he was shit." 

Louis laughs, shaking his head. “Do you think that perhaps the reason why you didn’t hear any noise is because I have some semblance of _respect_ for my flatmates?”

“Nah. Mike looks like a boring, vanilla type."

Louis snorts, "How'd you work that one out then, all those two seconds you saw him for?"

"I'm a people person."

"That doesn't mean anything," Louis said laughing. "Anyway, why is it that the first guy I pull, you're determined he's shit in bed? You're my mate, you should be supporting my escapades."

"I am, Louis. In fact, I make a personal pledge to always be supportive of your sexual needs," Harry says, giving Louis a wink that's so crass that Louis has to swipe him, but also with just a hint of _please_. "Kidding. But you know, he just seems the type to... like, make you breakfast in bed in the morning.”

“Oh, the ‘courteous’ type, you mean?"

"Courteous, perhaps, but the point is, Louis, you didn't  _want_ breakfast in bed, you wanted a lazy morning shag. But Mike goes straight for the breakfast in bed."

Louis rolls his eyes. "You're literally not making sense. Also, his name is Matt.”

“That’s what I said, Mark,” but he can see Harry is grinning, so he just bites his lip to hold back a laugh and pulls sharp on a wayward curl.

 

Matt greets him sweetly when Louis lets him into the kitchen, a bottle of white in his hand, which Louis doesn’t really like, he’s more of a red kind of guy, but he kisses him on the cheek anyway. Louis thanks him then gets to cooking quickly, as he still has a bit of work to do for his seminar tomorrow and can’t ask Louise for her notes again.

Matt is round the table, playing on his phone whilst some Bon Iver song (too indie for Louis’ taste to recognise) croons quietly from his keychain speaker. The seating area of the kitchen and the cooking/preparing area is separated by a tiled wall, which always gives Louis anxiety because he never realises he isn’t alone in the kitchen before he sees someone walk out from behind it.

Harry comes in at one point when Louis is working out how to fit all the spaghetti in a pan, and sticks his head round to the non-dining part of the kitchen. He sniffs in the air, not bothering to introduce himself to Louis or Matt when he walks in.

“What you doing?” Harry asks, brows furrowed.

Louis hums, trying to look busy for him, heart speeding up all the same. He tells himself it’s because two handsome men are in the same room, and Louis wants them to both fight over him and then for it to dissolve into a threesome. Louis realises at this thought it is imperative he gets laid soon.

“Cooking meatballs and spaghetti,” Louis replies in an airy manner, keeping his head high and stirring the sauce. 

After a beat, Harry says “you’re doing it wrong.” Louis narrows his eyes at Harry from over his shoulder. _How wrong can you be with spaghetti and meatballs_? He fears to ask.

“Alright, Ramsey. What would you know about it, anyway?”

“I did home-ec as a GCSE and got an A. Anyway, move over, I’ll show you.” He goes to stand by Louis, placing a hand on his hip and moving him to the side, taking the spoon from Louis’ hand.

“Lou,” he laughs suddenly, when he looks at what is before him. “This is the wrong spoon, first of all. Plastic can melt, you noob. Go into my drawer and get me that wooden one, on the left”. Louis obliges, but he doesn’t know why because this is supposed to be _his and Matt’s_ meal and he desperately hopes Matt can’t hear how dreadful Louis is at cooking and that he almost melted a spoon into the tomato mix.

Whilst Harry expertly stirs and flips the meatballs over, Louis has a chance to observe how cosy he looks, in his Marvel pyjama bottoms and thin grey cotton shirt, the humidity from the cooking making the hair near his roots frizzy and cute. Harry adds a few spices here and there from his own cupboard, some which Louis didn’t know nature actually engendered, and Louis is left to feel totally inept beside him. The music on Matt’s speaker from the other section of the room changes, to Tiny Dancer by Elton John, and Harry knows every note, _dah-dah-dah_ ing the intro and singing the first few words.

“You’re a good singer,” Louis says quietly, kind of not wanting Harry to hear how Louis is always in awe of him.

Harry gives him a grin from over his shoulder. He puts the spatula on the side, leaving an orange residue and looks quickly to the entrance of the dining part of the kitchen, before he takes Louis by the hands. They clasp awkwardly because Lord knows they both can’t dance, doing an awkward jig that Louis is both wholly embarrassed and yet overjoyed to be a part of, because Harry is there, and Harry is looking at Louis like he has a secret he's not telling.  
  
“ _Pretty eyes,_ something something _, you’ll marry a music mannn,_ ” Harry sings in his ear, very quietly, and Louis can feel the cool wetness of his lips there. Louis laughs because his breath is tickling him, then Harry snickers because he must also realise how stupid this is, “ _Oh how it feels so real, lying here with no one near, only you and you can hear me, when I say softly, slowly…_ ”, and his _voice…_ fuck, it makes his insides melt, his heart feel too big for his chest. Harry snakes a hand to cradle the back of Louis’ head, and he turns his face into the side of Louis’, and Louis stills and thinks, there must be some boundary that is being crossed here, there must, because Louis’ blood is thrumming in his veins and Harry’s breath is leaving wetness on his skin, cooling in the air. He can feel the prickling of his facial hair that Harry was too lazy to shave igniting Louis’ skin beneath it.  
  
But he can’t do anything because he is captivated by Harry, even though the person he is about to have dinner with is in the room literally next to him, could walk in at any moment...

“Oh tits, the sauce!” Harry says suddenly, making Louis jump, immediately dropping his hands. Harry runs over to the stove and the pan hisses at him, but he eventually appears to tackle everything back under control. A few minutes later, the sieving and garnishing done, Harry dishes up two plates of steaming pasta and meatballs, and Louis is again lost for words.

“Thanks,” he mumbles, embarrassed but also too proud to show gratitude for help he never asked for. “Erm,” he scratches the back of his neck, wondering what the correct etiquette is now with Harry is staring at him, with wide green eyes, waiting for him to speak. “You want some, too?”

Harry snorts, rolling his eyes. “Nah, thanks. Wouldn’t want to ruin your date.”

He stills for a moment, then makes a move for the door, and Louis grabs him by the back of his shirt, soft and warm. When Harry turns around, he can see almost every detail of his face, smell his deodorant, see the blue flecks in his eyes as he towers over him. Harry grasps Louis’ elbows with both hands automatically, eyes searching his, waiting for him to speak.   

“It’s... not a date,” Louis whispers, not sure why he feels the urge to clarify this to Harry, and wishing he had something else to say. He feels awkward because he feels he used too much force just to protest a moot point.

Harry raises an eyebrow, and Louis hates that he can make him feel so stupid, when he’s so much younger than him. “You might want to tell him that, mate,” he says.  
  
_Mate_.  
  
He reaches for the door, not bothering to say goodnight or anything. Louis is once again left feeling confused. It also kind of leaves Louis a bit pissed off- what business is it of his, that he should tell Matt? And why should he do anything just because Harry tells him to? Harry walks out the door, pretending not to hear Matt’s “hey”, which Louis just thinks is fucking rude.

“Ignore him,” Louis says to Matt’s deflated expression, laying the hot plates on the table for them and grabbing the wine glasses. “He’s probably just pissed off that Sarah girl hasn’t been around in a while.” Louis had told Matt all about the sex debacles the night he had stayed round, but had not yet had the honour to hear the shit show himself.

 

It’s about an hour later, as they’re finishing their second glass and talking about Cromwell’s rule in Ireland, which Louis had covered in A Level in some depth and it was the focus of Matt’s current essay, he sees her. Only for a second, but through the window of the kitchen door, he sees a short haired, blonde girl making a beeline for Harry’s door. Louis swallows his wine, looking back to Matt who had not noticed anything, still talking, and smiles. He hears Harry’s door open, and close, and his heart sinks.

The noise that night is unbelievable.  
  
He had just said goodbye to Matt, kissing him on the cheek before he went back to his own halls, the other side of campus. Louis is trying to focus on his seminar work at his desk, when the noise starts. This time, however, is different than with Ginger or Sarah.

This time, it sounds aggressive, rough, like Harry’s on a mission. It goes on for ages too, up to an hour, which is, according to Louis’ well-acquainted knowledge on Harry’s sex life, unprecedented thus far. Louis puts his earphones in, to not much avail as the banging on the wall by his bed is hard to ignore. Still, he manages to get his work done and went to bed just before twelve, when the noise had been reduced to just Harry. He can’t hear the girl at all, except for some muffled whines sometimes. Harry is loud this time, growling, his deep voice, thick accent, and Louis can pinpoint that he was right next to the wall, just like Louis, deep in someone. 

For the first time, he gives in and lets a hand wander into his boxers, squeezing his eyes shut as he finally put a hand on himself and listens desperately to Harry coming next to him in the dark.

 

Wednesday brings with it a drizzly morning with Louis running late to his Literature lecture. Matt seems to have left some time earlier that morning without waking him. He had slept round after the flat had played a game of Articulate yesterday together in the kitchen. It was good fun, with Harry actually being the good at something for once. He had tied scores with Matt, and they both had to go head to head. Harry was describing to Jade, and Matt was describing to Louis, and of course Louis had made sure his team won. Harry cussed them out loudly, and Matt had pulled Louis up into his lap, tipsy from a few gins, and kissed him for the first time in front of everyone. Alice pretended to vomit in her gin balloon, and Niall had shouted “pass it to me when you’re done, Al, think I have something coming up too. Fuckin’ love birds,” and Louis had given them the finger.  
  
After, everyone began to excuse themselves to bed, and Matt started packing the game away as Louis carried his glasses to the sink to wash up. As he had his front to the sink, elbows in the water, he felt warmth next to him and noticed Harry standing there, dunking his glass in the washing up bowl. They were silent for a bit, and Louis was unsure whether to say anything at all. The atmosphere between them was bittersweet recently: always a mix of nerves and irritation, the need to act, but to do what exactly was unclear to Louis.

“Make sure you tell your boyfriend well done for winning,” Harry whispered, right to the shell of Louis’ ear as he leans over to rinse the glass, before leaning back. Louis felt all the hairs along his neck stand up. He should really tell Harry to stop doing that. He threw a sarcastic look to Harry and hit his chest. Harry laughed and caught his fists with his still-wet hands, keeping them still against his firm chest, Louis feeling each rising breath.  
  
“He’s in there, why don’t you tell ‘im yourself?” Louis said then, challengingly.

“Wouldn’t want you to get jealous.” Harry quipped.

“Har-har. I’ve told you, we’re not even _dating_. Anyway, Harold, where’s _your_ harem of women? Maybe they could’ve won you the game. There’d be enough guessers, that’s for sure,” He turned around, stealing his hands back.

“Cheeky,” remarked Harry, wagging a finger, but not bothering to deny the accusation that he does sleep around. “But I doubt it.”  
  
When a few moments passed, and Louis didn't receive any other response, he looks again to Harry and sees he is still there, playing with a tea towel in his hand, checking round the corner, presumably on Matt. Louis supposes he saw what he wanted to, because Harry came back, behind Louis, and whispered, close enough to hear the smile on his lips when he said it:

“Besides, you and I both know I don’t play _board games_ with them.”  
  
At that moment, Matt rounded the corner into the side of the kitchen they’re standing in, and Harry jumped back in time, giving Matt a small smile, _the shit_ , before excusing himself to his room. If Harry thought he was being charming, he is sorely mistaken.  
  
Wednesday also brings him bumping into not Harry in the bathroom, but the blonde short-haired girl from a few days ago, Lucy. Harry’s new beau. He didn’t hear her arriving last night, but he and Matt had passed out pretty quickly. He gives her a polite smile, sliding past her to brush his teeth and then leaves.

He sees Louise towards the back of the lecture hall when he gets there, sliding in next to her as she gives him a kiss on the cheek.  
  
“‘Ello babe. Alarm not working?” She asks, teasing. 

Louis groans. “Something like that. I’ve been sleeping in loads lately.”

Louise winks. “It’s all those late nights, you know.” Louise knows the situation with Harry too, as she frequently stays in Flat 28 with Alex, and sometimes hears him through the hallway. She finds it hilarious though, and always laughs when Louis is complaining to her seriously about it.

“Dude, it’s actually killing me.” he says, bending forward and putting his head in his hands. “I don’t think I can stand another night."

”Oh yeah,” Louise says, sitting upright and jostling Louis. “I was meant to tell you actually, you know Lucy?”

“Or as I like to call her, ‘ _uggghhhh Luce’_ , as that is more frequently how she is referred to in my presence.”

“Whatever. She’s on my hockey team and-”

“You do hockey?” Louis asks.

“What? Yeah, since ages. So does Alice. Anyway, listen. So, we were out for this social thing in Spoons a few days ago and we were playing _Never Have I Ever_ , and oh my God, the things I heard Louis. The things I heard.” Louis snorts.

“Yeah, I bet. Well, go on. Tell us, it would really paint the other half of the picture I’ve already had painted for me.” he thinks, shuddering. He also knows that hearing this information would take him past the point of no return, as suspecting is different from actually knowing what Harry gets up to. What’s the book that says ‘context is everything’? Because that’s how Louis feels now. With context, he will have no choice but to put an image to the sound, and that will make it so much harder to not think about Harry naked and fucking in explicit, visual detail.

“Well,” Louise says, but stopping when she sees the lecturer frowning at her from the front. He goes back to explaining Antithesis and Louise continues, voice dropping to just below a whisper. “It was basically like Josh saying he’d never done anal to anyone and then she drank and I was like, what the hell? So we asked her who with and she turned like, really, really red.”

Louis has to hold his nose with how much laughter he’s holding in, making this odd sound. A few people turn around in the row in front of them and squint at him, and Louis narrows his eyes in return. “Don’t look at me,” he shoots at them. Honestly, what else was literature class for, if not discussing Lucy Bushell taking it up the arse by Harry Styles.

“Shut up… I didn’t expect that. But how?” Louis quips. “She seems so uptight, I doubt my bloody pinky would fit up there.” He and Louise break out into loud giggles, so they have to excuse themselves and go outside the lecture hall. The giggles subside, and then Louise frowns, as if having a second thought that occurred to her.

“She did mention something really weird to me and Alice, though.”

“Like what?”

“Lucy was like, when he seems annoyed or whatever, he _only_ wants to do anal. Like, will flip her over and just start…”

Louis puts his hand up, “that’s quite enough I think, Louise.” He thinks further on this. “That is a bit weird though, innit? Like… why?”

Louise shrugs. “I dunno, she was pretty drunk. But that’s what Alice and I thought. Alice said maybe it was, like, a control thing.”

Louis thinks on this some more. “Why is he annoyed also? Why would you even _have_ sex if you were annoyed with her?”

“That’s the thing,” Louise says, gravely, eyes wide, her voice conspiratorial. “I don’t think it is her that he’s bothered by. She asked him what was bothering him and he was apparently really dismissive.” Louis thinks on this for a minute, looking into Louise’s wide blue eyes.

“When was this, anyway?” Louis asks.  
  
“Er, Saturday I think.” Louis thinks about this. That must’ve been the day Harry cooked for Louis and Matt. He did _seem_ a bit cranky to Louis that evening, if he’s honest.

“Fucking hell,” is what he settles for eventually. “Kinky bastard, that Harry, in’t he?”

Louise hits him and he squeezes her hand and they walk back into the lecture hall, to the chagrin of their fellow classmates.

 

  
They’re doing pres for karaoke that night, except Henry and Liam, who are busy being geeks in Comp Soc. Louise and Alex awere also busy, going on some double date thing with someone from Hockey and her boyfriend. Lucy, apparently, could also not make it, or simply wasn’t invited, if the absence of a short, blonde girl round the table sucking Harry’s face is anything to go by. Louis can’t help but feel relieved, knowing he won’t have to be subject to loud sex tonight if Harry gets whiskey dick.  
  
_Note to self:,_ Louis mentally jots down, _get Harry smashed._

Matt, on the other hand, stayed true to his word and it was his second week joining them for karaoke at the Student Union. Last time he and Matt managed to cover Ed Sheeran’s _A Team_ pretty damn well, if he says so himself, though it was nothing compared to Harry’s _Sex Bomb_ , which literally had the girls in the pub screaming. At one point he even got on his knees on stage, feeling down his chest, head thrown back with hair in his eyes, singing in an incredibly low baritone ‘ _baby, you can turn me on’_ and he _grabbed his crotch_. It was a joke, of course, and everyone laughed and clapped, and so did Louis, with a very hot face and a racing heart. He is not at all surprised how he gets so many women with that kind of zealous confidence. He swallows audibly. Louis hates him.

So there they were; Louis down one end of the kitchen table with Matt, Harry on the other with his trusty rum and Coke with Jade next to him, slyly nicking some of his rum for her own Lemonade, and Alice and Niall sat shoulder to shoulder, hands under the table somewhere. They still pretended to not be going out, but they were always the talk of the group both when they were present and not. Alice frequently gave up girl time to watch a film with Niall, or Niall would be known to bail on a guys' night if Alice was free from revision that night, and it would probably annoy Louis if he didn't find it completely adorable.  
  
“Right, ya bunch of wankers, whose go is it then?” asks Niall, standing up and arranging some cards into a circle, placing a disposable cup in the middle of them, which Louis was sure had not been cleaned since the first week.

“Oh, not Ring of Fire, Ni, I’m so bored of it!” Alice complained, pulling on the bottom of his shirt.

“Yeah, Ring of Fire is getting old,” Niall says immediately, messing up the cards’ formation as if to conceal that fact he had been intent on playing it literally just seconds before. “What about… truth or dare?”

“Yes!” Harry said, eyes lighting up. “Let’s make things interesting…” he said, pulling kissy faces at Jade, who prodded a finger into his nipple, which was exposed by his barely-buttoned silk shirt. He rubbed it dramatically and pouted.

“Sod off, that’s for babies. Why not just Never Have I Ever?” Jade suggests, and Louis kind of hates that game just because it’s not _really_ never have I ever, is it? It’s just finding out who’s done what in bed.  
  
Though, with the look Alice is giving Louis now, he supposes this could work to his advantage and get some dirt on Harry to wind him up with.

“Sure!” Louis says suddenly, nearly coming away from his seat. “I mean,” he says, after everyone’s eyes are directed at him. “I suppose it could be fun,” he says, clearing his throat. 

“Great!” says Harry, running a hand through the front of his hair, which was quiffed back lazily tonight. “Sorted. My go first, drink if you have. Okay, never have I ever… fucked someone outside.” He drinks, as Louis would have suspected, and so does Niall and Alice, which has Louis flabbergasted.  
  
The game continues like that, Alice mentioning with a sly wink to Louis that she has never given or received anal, and Louis and Matt drink, shockingly Jade too, and then, gingerly, Harry raises his drink to his lips. Alice and Louis meet eyes at this moment and laugh, remembering what Lucy had said about ' _when Harry gets annoyed’_.  
  
“What?” Harry says, noticing he’s the butt of their joke.  
  
When they refused to tell him, he gets huffy with them, and Alice texted him from under the table **oh shit son, #prayforlucy tonight** , which made Louis laugh even harder.

Jade mentions not having performed oral on a woman, and everyone is quite shocked when Louis drinks, too (“what?” he asked, swallowing his wine spritzer. “I was fifteen!”. Harry laughed, impressed. “Louis Tomlinson,” he said, eyes gleaming in a boyish manner, “a sexual connoisseur’).  

To Louis’ disappointment, Matt is kind of bland when it comes to the inventiveness of his Never Have I Evers. When his turn arrives, he tries to say pass, but the girls are having none of it. He says, coughing into his hand, “never have I ever… kissed someone whose name I didn’t know.”  
  
Harry rolls his eyes. “Ooh, you devil, you,” he murmurs sarcastically, looking down and pulling some skin from his thumb. Jade thumps him in the arm, giggling. She tells him off for being mean, and everyone, including Matt, takes a sip.

When it gets to Louis’ turn, he thinks for a while, wanting to find something really good. What he finally settles for is “never have I ever fantasised about someone the same sex as me.”  
  
Niall raises it to his lips, and Alice squeaks (Louis doesn’t know if it’s in a good way or bad way, as Alice is a strange girl) but then Niall puts it down again without taking a sip, claiming he’s only kidding. Louis and Matt both take a sip, which makes Louis’ belly glow when Matt squeezes his knee under the table. 

But then Harry drinks, too. And Louis’ belly positively _sinks._ He doesn’t think anyone else sees, as they’re still laughing at Niall’s joke. But Louis sees. Louis can’t unsee. And Harry knows Louis sees, because he meets his eyes and tucks a smile into the rim of his glass.

Louis excuses himself to the toilet then, locking the door and washing his face. _What the fuck does that mean?_ He asks himself, looking into the mirror above the sink. _I mean, of course you can be straight and have the odd fantasy, but is that what that meant?_ Louis didn’t know whether he hoped that is what Harry’s sip indicated or not. Fuck… after all, Louis had been dead-set on believing Harry had _no_ affiliation to men, none whatsoever. But if he did enough to fantasise about someone… God, that lucky man whoever is the subject of Harry’s fantasies, Louis thinks wistfully. The smile, too. How could Louis forget the clandestine smile, how could Louis live with the sip that no one else saw, that conferred the information _I, Harry Styles, have sexually and voluntarily thought about another man and I enjoyed it._

Louis was overthinking this. He shakes his head and goes back into the kitchen. The games seem to have stopped by this point, instead everyone has dissolved into chatting, laughing and drinking more. He sees Harry laughing with Niall about something, slapping him on the thigh where Niall’s presumably said something so outrageous, and Louis is convinced everything has gone back to normal.  
  
Everything must go back to normal.

 

Louis is pulling his hair out, rifling through his Eiffel Tower stack of notes on his desk because he _just needs to fucking prepare_ for this half term exam and he doesn’t know where to start. He has two days to do so, and he couldn’t properly prepare for before this point because… well, he’s had other things on his mind. Like, Matt. And the new series of Game of Thrones. And arranging venues for the Language Pub Crawl. And getting drunk. And Harry… More specifically, Harry sounding like he’s knocking someone up next door. Yes, that’s why he couldn’t prepare.

Just as he’s running his hands through his hair, muttering angrily to himself _where is the bastarding thing?_ in reference to his lecture notes on female sexuality in _Tess of the D’Urbervilles,_ he get a knock on his door.

“ _Yes?!”_ He huffs, maybe a bit _too_ snappy, bent over with his head deep in the folders by the side of his desk.

Harry enters, looking a tad abashed, Louis assumed from his unwelcoming tone, the top of his cheeks pink. Louis straightens up immediately. He takes him in: Harry’s hands are clasped in the pocket of his navy Wills hoodie he’s got on, and Louis kind of hates him in that moment because even in sweats he looks like a fucking Abercrombie model.

“Oh,” Louis breathes, willing his face to de-redden after all the blood had rushed to his face from leaning over. “It’s you,” he says, because he didn’t know what else to say. It comes out a bit too sincere. 

“It’s me,” Harry says softly, smiling. It is rather an odd sight actually, seeing Harry in a space so personal to Louis; his tall frame in soft fabric, dark curls a bit greasy and piled on the top of his head, his bare feet nudging a jacket Louis had left on the floor, all too wholesome to be in Louis’ room. He looked totally juxtaposed amongst his Pink Floyd poster and messy desk and empty packets of Quavers that he’d been binge-eating in his revision-induced breakdown. It occurs to Louis that Harry had indeed never been in his room before, except maybe for knocking on his door and telling him it was _time to leave for karaoke,_ and _was he ready_ or _is it my turn or your turn to buy the loo roll_? This in mind, Louis’ stomach flutters with something akin to nerves.

Harry takes in the bedlam before him, his full lips pulling up on one side in a kind of half-smile, leaning against the wall. “What on _earth_ are you doing?” he asks, voice amused.

“Long story,” Louis mumbles, scratching the back of his neck, something he'd done since he was little when he was feeling tense.

“I’m sure,” Harry says, eyebrow piqued. “Anyway,” he clears his throat, “I just wanted to ask if you needed anything from Tesco, I’m about to head down.”

Louis thinks on this, and dismisses the instant internal screams of _wine, to drown the misery of my heart,_ and instead listens to the more helpful of his brain’s suggestions, like _more tea because it is a healthier alternative dose of caffeine._ He also needs to grab something for dinner, because it had just occurred to him he hadn’t actually eaten since the early afternoon.

“Sure,” he says, “in fact, give me a sec and I’ll come with you.” He takes off his maroon University of Surrey hoodie that had not been washed in approx. ten days, in favour of his cleaner purple Nike one. It has nothing to do with the fact he doesn’t want Harry to see him in a state. As he does so, he pulls with perhaps too much vigour and feels the shirt underneath rise, head stuck in the neckline. Once he removes the item, he chucks it on the bed and when he glances up, he sees Harry looking at him. Louis shifts under his gaze.

“Ready?” Louis asks, and Harry’s eyes meet his then, bearing a flashy grin.

“Let’s go,” he says, turning on his heels and holding the door open for him.

Harry takes them down the longer route to Tesco, which Louis finds odd but doesn’t point this out. It’s only five minutes extra, maximum, estimates Louis, but it affords the prettier side of the campus by the lake. It’s about six o’clock, and the warm, late summer air is aromatic, alive with the smell of the water, lavender and perennials.  
  
He and Harry walk side by side, and Louis finds himself grateful for time spent just the two of them, as it is rare with such a large friendship group. They see Liam on the way back from a late maths seminar, and give him a wave. Harry is a big talker, chatting Louis’ ear off about his morning Law seminar, and the debate society which he detests because _they’re all literally controversial dickheads, Lou_.  
  
Louis asks if that isn’t the point of a debate society: taking the role of Devil’s advocate, and Harry tells him he’s being hypocritical in that moment, for doing that exact thing. He smiles at that. He likes how Harry thinks, with logic being a clear driving-factor for what he says, and sue him if he’s attracted to intelligence. He’s sure a lot of people are.  
  
Harry makes rash judgements, like Louis, but he’s not nasty about them, or obtuse. He’s open-minded, forward-thinking and his political views are heartily socially-driven. He talks passionately, and Louis finds he loves that. He looks up at Harry’s profile as he’s talking, the sun beginning to set behind him, his strong jaw and noble nose and wide set eyes and full lips, and finds it hard to think that standing before him is the same man who he hears at night, who seems so rough and who brings almost anyone back with him, who is adventurous and dangerous and reckless and loud. The feeling he gets from reconciling the two buries its way to the bottom of Louis’ stomach and doesn’t leave for the entire evening. Their chat strays away from Matt or any of Harry’s conquests, whether deliberately on Harry’s part or not, and Louis is quite grateful for it.

 

It falls silent for a bit, as they leave the campus and head into Guildford town centre. Louis’s grateful that Harry is the kind of person where all silences that occur between them do not fill Louis with the social anxiety that he must inject them with mindless natter. Instead, it’s nice, and the background buzz of dying rush-hour traffic underneath them as they walk over the bridge leaves Louis calm.

“I’m glad I got the chance to talk to you, actually,” Harry says, side-eyeing him. Louis looks at him inquisitively.

“Oh right. How come?” Louis squashes the tiny, impertinent voice in his brain which hopes for, expects, even, a romantic declaration from a Mills and Boon novel, something like _“Louis, I may fuck a thousand women, but it’s you I really want. Ever since I found out I was sharing a toilet with you, my loins were set aflame”_. It sounds more romantic in Louis head, and he believes he cannot be blamed as he is a literature student, after all.

“Erm, like, you know the night you came out?” Louis nods, having no idea where this was going. “Well, I think I acted kind of off with you. And I think I might have acted off with you sometimes after. But, I don’t know. I just wanted you to know that I don’t - have a problem with that kind of thing,” he rushes to add. “In fact, I think what you did was really cool. It wasn’t my intention to make you feel uncomfortable, you know, if I did.”

They look at each other, stopping outside the large Tesco. Louis blinks three times.

“You never made me feel uncomfortable, Harry.” Louis says, and he realises then how proximately close they are, how private they’re being, though nothing requires them to be so.

“Good. I, you know. I did act kind of off, but it wasn’t because you’re gay. Well, it was a little bit, but not _because_ you’re gay.”

Louis didn’t know what this meant, so he prompted him by cocking his head and giving him a puzzled look.

“It’s not important now, as long as you know I didn’t mean to offend you,” Harry says. “But I want you to know... I like you just the way you are." 

It hits Louis in a way it probably shouldn’t, not when he’s got _this thing_ going on with Matt. He’s just… he’s had a really shit day and Harry is letting him know he appreciates him and he’s enough and Louis’ smile is so wide then that he hides it behind the back of his hand.

Harry returns it, dimple showing on his left cheek. Louis drills his finger in it because he has a desire to touch him but this was the most immediate and only British Board of Film Classification ‘Universal for All Ages’ response he could think of. He locks the ‘18’ responses at the back of his mind.

“You’re a softy, Styles,” Louis says, then pinches his cheek, this side of too hard. Harry smacks him bum lightly in a sign of feigned indignity and pushes him into Tesco. Louis goes willingly.

  
  
They make it a weekly thing, going shopping together. Harry will turn up to his room on random days, wrapped up warmer each time, shopping bag in hand, and they always take the longest route down by the serene autumnal lakeside. Harry likes to pick up random items and make _dreadful_ puns (or “bread-ful”, as Harry had once said, and Louis stared at him. “End it, Harry,” Louis said, straight-faced, unamused. “What a… bread-pan expression” Harry said. “Die,”). So yeah, he’s totally fucking useless, but also Louis finds him totally endearing, will probably always, but Harry has no right to see. Harry has the weirdest taste in food, too, which Louis is repulsed at.  
  
“ _Chick peas?_ ” Louis says, pulling a disgusted face at the tin that Harry puts in his Bag for Life. 

“Yeah?” He says, looking around, quite offended.

“But… _why?”_

“Oi, you curry these bad boys and that’s some good eatin’,” Harry says, pointing a finger into Louis’ chest before picking up a pack of bay leaves from the next aisle.

Louis rolls his eyes. “You’re a fucking uni student, mate. Why can’t you be normal? There’s Mr Kipling cakes over there for a quid. _A quid_. That’s six cakes, Harry. For-”  
  
“Yeah, a quid, I heard.” They manoeuvre to the tea aisle, waiting patiently behind an old lady who can’t decide whether to buy the hard water tea bags or just the normal ones.  
  
“And I have a body to upkeep, Lou. We can’t all have an arse like yours, some of us have to put the work in,” he says, leaning back for dramatics to check out his arse, then pulling a drooling expression, tongue lulling out. It's not like it's the first time Harry's made the comment, but it riles Louis' belly up anyway.

“I… feel abused.” Louis settles for eventually, trying hard not to blush under Harry’s attention. He can feel his face getting hot, he thinks it's his default state around Harry, but he has a suspicion that Harry enjoys it that way.

“You love it.” Harry whispers, grabbing his bum sneakily behind the old woman and Louis jumps, laughing out loud. The old lady looks at them in shock, and Harry smiles apologetically.

“I think _you_ love it,” Louis whispers.

Harry hums, giving it a quick smack. “I do…” Harry says, in a low voice, which does dreadful things to Louis, so he just grabs a pack of PG Tips before he gets hard in a fucking Tescos.

They are touchy-feely, is the thing. Their relationship from the start had always been very physical (but not in the way Louis had hoped a few months ago, sadly). It hadn’t really ever been a problem, if Louis pulls Harry’s hair sneakily, or pinching his cheeks, or Harry smacks his bum when he’s telling him off for something stupid, or tries to pick him up drunkenly on a night out. That’s just what they’ve always done, but it makes it difficult now for Louis since the whole _I’ve fantasised about men_ revelation because he can’t help but hope… he feels guilty for even thinking these thoughts, because of Matt, though he and Matt aren’t really anything.

He knows what Harry’s _like_ , is the thing. He’s seen it with his own eyes: brazen, flirty, overtly-sexual, charming, teasing. And he’s seen it work on _everybody_. So Louis can’t let it work on him, because Louis is gay, and he liked Harry, so he doesn’t want to fuck around pining after a guy who won’t ever like him back, whose interest in Louis stops when it’s no longer a fun game for him. And that is just about how coherent Louis’ current perspective on his relationships/friendships are. That is, not at all.  
  
They walk out of the store after paying, mindlessly chatting about the girl they hate on the new series of Love Island they all watch as a flat. As he’s reaching in his side trackie pocket for his fags, he feels thin, cardboard box. He pulls it out, inquisitive.

“Trojan Magnum condoms…?” he read the black design.

Louis shoots a look at Harry, who is snickering beside him, trying to be quiet by holding his nose but his eyes are watering. “Harry,” he utters through gritted teeth. Harry looks at him with wide doe eyes and there is a naughty hint to his smile so Louis knows.

“Sorry, I must’ve misplaced ‘em,” Harry says, snatching them out of his hands and dropping them unceremoniously into his bag.

 “You fuckin’ wish you fitted those. Don’t think I haven’t seen the packets you leave in the toilet. Also, did you really slip these into my pocket? Harry, I could have got _arrested_. Over _condoms_.”

“Funny though, was’nit?”

“No. And I hate you."

"Mean."

"You know the saying. Anyway, what’s say we go drop all this shit off and ask Niall if we can smoke some of his weed on the back field with everyone?” he suggests, because it's actually a nice day today and he'd hate to waste it doing nout. 

Harry takes his phone out of his pocket with one hand, thumbing a notification to the left, then putting it back. “Can’t, I’m afraid. Meeting this girl from my debate society group for a drink.”

That makes Louis feel a bit… weird. Because like, Louis can deal with the sex. He can deal with the many girls who come in and out of Harry’s room, can deal with the snogs in the clubs he sees Harry enjoy, he just turns a blind eye to it. But like… a date. A date which may lead to more dates, who knows? Which may lead to someone else being part of their group, which he didn’t know if he wanted, not everyone could be as nice as Louise.

Although Harry tries to revive conversation after that, Louis can’t help but feel there is a weight in his stomach that he cannot ignore. He can’t help but feel nervous, even though he has _absolutely no right._

 

Tuesday brings the night of the pub crawl, and Louis is shitting a brick over the intricacies of it. He frets how many people will show up, if any, or if the pubs won’t let that many people in, or have forgotten that Louis made reservations for the tables. Matt comes over an hour before and calms him though, and they have a bottle of wine between them listening to Disney songs. They pre-drink, just the two of them in the kitchen, as Henry had mentioned something earlier that day about the flat going for some cocktails at the Student Union. He knows the flat would come if they could though, and he knows he needs to branch out, as nearly everyone in the group has their own interests, friends and hobbies on the side, too. 

 **Niall, 8:42pm** _good luck for d pub crawl tonight dikhed. If anyone can arrange a piss up in a brewery, its u x  
  
_

Louis doesn’t know what the last bit exactly means, and he’s not sure if it fills him with much confidence, but he sends him a love heart emoji anyway with ten kisses.  
  
As the night progresses however, and the wine in Louis’ blood calms his nerves, he can appreciate the worry was all in vain. The night is a huge success, if Louis says so himself. He is most pleased that he manages to get Matt so utterly smashed, that he actually pole dances in the second to last bar. Louis finds it so funny that he Snapchats it, knowing that if Matt kills him in the morning then at least it would’ve been worth it. They all move to the bar next, getting drinks and throwing money forward to buy the next round. Louis feels incredible, on a total high, with his friends around him and enough alcohol in his system to make him feel like he could do anything right now. He knows he'll probably pay for it in the morning, knows that it will probably make him miss his lectures tomorrow, but right now he couldn't care less.  _It's what first year is for, right?_ he thinks to himself, clinking glasses with Matt and the others, letting the sting of tequila burn its way down his throat.  
  
He gets a Snap notification at about 1am just as they’re in the smokers' area talking to a few girls from his course, the garden busy and loud. He squints at it, willing himself to stay still for just a moment to let the words come into focus. It’s just a chat message, but he thumbs it open once he sees who it’s from. 

 

 **Harry Styles** _Huh, would you look at that._ _  
_ _  
_ Above the message is the video of Matt that Louis had put on his story. Louis messages back immediately, because apparently when he’s drunk he has no awareness that he might come across as annoying or desperate. He spies Matt making his way to the bar with the Vice President of the Language society, then he begins typing, the screen blurry.

 **Me** _what?? >_ **  
**  
And then, almost instantly, 

 **Harry Styles** so y _our boyfriend does have a personality_  
  
Louis’ brow scrunches, because he _thinks_ that’s rude but he’s really drunk and so he doesn’t know for sure. From the bar, Matt calls him over to take a shot of vodka, so Louis saves the message and vows himself to look at it later, feeling an inner sense of pride that he ignored Harry.

If the amount of pissed Freshers there were running around campus because of Louis’ doing is indicative of anything, Louis thinks it means he arranged a fucking good pub crawl. Everyone pats him on the back when they walk back to campus, saying thanks for a good night and how they’ve got some parties coming up, and would he like to go?  Louis thinks for once that he might just get over this whole Harry predicament he got into, noticing how tonight he hardly thought of Harry at all, had an amazing time dancing with new people who have the same interests, who weren’t trying to flirt with anyone and everyone. Just having this time to bond with Matt with no one around, and be in his own circle of friends away from Harry, where he can choose who he wants around and not feel like he’s suffocated by them sometimes… Louis thinks he’s made the right decision.

Matt and Louis make their way arm in arm to Richmond halls. Matt is a lot more handsy than usual, putting his hands in Louis’ back pockets and squeezing, and Louis has to act all indignant, but really he is so ready for this university celibacy thing to be over he could almost die. 

They have sex that night, both drunk, Louis not even caring about the noise of the bed banging against the wall, or of Matt’s quite… _unique_ moans as he moves over Louis, because it’s so late anyway and he didn't see any of the flat when he came in, so he assumes they aren’t back yet. It’s nice, and Matt is really kind and caring about it all, and they both came, so what’s it matter if there’s fireworks or not?

 

Matt is falling asleep next to him already, so Louis kisses the side of his head and goes to clean himself in the toilet, fishing for his boxers in case he might come across one of the Mystical Eight on his travels. He jerks open the handle of the bathroom, and sees Harry just pulling up his trousers.    
  
“Oh!” Louis exlaims, hand on his heart. “Harry. You gave me a scare,” he laughs, nervously. He didn’t know Harry was in his room, he assumed he had gone with the others to the Student Union.  
  
“Sorry,” says Harry, a bit short, flushing and then running the tap to douse his hands, the sound too abrupt for the silence that is ensuing all around them. Louis furrows his eyebrows a bit when Harry doesn’t laugh with him. Harry forgoes drying his hands on the towel and attempts to leave hastily, right past where Louis stands in the doorway, their bodies just brushing. Louis senses something is off, and grabs his wrist, where he comes to a halt.  
  
“You alright?” Louis asks, and Harry doesn’t even bother turning his whole body, or meeting his eye, but Louis can see Harry’s reflection in the mirror above the sink, expression twisted.  
  
“Fine,” he says curtly, and gives a very brief, tight smile, as if to convince him, though Louis is not persuaded.  
  
"Have I done something?" Louis asks, and his chest tightens, because he can't stand the thought of Harry being annoyed with him. He'd rather be told what it is.

"Nope," Harry says, popping the  _p_ and then wishes him goodnight, leaving abruptly, the air cold behind the swishing door.  
  
Louis stands there, blinking, wondering what on Earth he did wrong.

  
  
If Harry were annoyed with Louis a few nights ago, you wouldn’t have thought it, as it only took a day and then Harry went back to his normal, annoying self. Friday swings around, and Louis is so ready to end for his lectures, even though it’s still early. He’s had such a long arse week, with the pub crawl literally draining him to the extent that he had to miss a whole day’s worth of lectures the day after because he was hanging so bad. He spent the entire week catching up with what he missed and making notes, as well as finishing his essay on _subdued homosexuality in 20th century texts_.  
  
The boys have already planned to have a ‘lads’ night’, purely because Jade, Alice and Louise had already planned a ‘girls’ night’ without them, and he suspects Niall felt jealous of having not been invited, if the message to the group chat was anything to go by (“Conniving cow bags!!” Niall wrote. “Can’t believe we’re not invited to watch a film with them! What do they have that we don’t?” “Vaginas?” Harry supplied).  
  
Matt couldn’t make it, as he had an essay due in Monday that he had to finish prep for. Louis wasn’t too put out by it, though, as he hadn’t spent time with just the Flat 28 boys in a while, and missed their idiotic, teenage ways.  
  
Louis can’t find Louise after a quick swipe over the lecture hall, assuming she has slept in again, so he takes a seat by himself, when he feels his phone vibrate.

 

  
It’s nearing the end of term, Louis feeling utterly fucked for the upcoming exams. They don’t count towards anything, but Louis refuses to let go of his dream for that perfect First Class. He ends up studying quite a bit in fact, much to Alex, Henry and Harry’s annoyance, as they still go out most nights, and bully him on the lads’ group chat for taking his work too seriously. Louis genuinely wonders how Harry can still be doing so well in class when he doesn’t think he’s seen or heard Harry do anything other than party, fuck people loudly and annoy Louis in his spare time. However, the good news is that nothing even did come of the date that Harry went on. Louis doesn’t want to explain to himself why he’s relieved, so he simply accepts it and is grateful for it.

He does spend more time with the girls though, especially Louise and Alice, as can usually be found testing each other on a liturgy of flashcards (Jade, however, spends a lot of time with the boys because she doesn’t have exams for psychology so early on). He quite enjoys hanging around with them; they’re far less dramatic than the boys and have a much more interesting love life, and actually ask Louis to elaborate, instead of trying to one-up him.

Louise and Alice say how they’re going to France together with Niall and Alex in the Christmas holidays for a skiing break. Louis can’t help but have a massive Fear Of Missing Out pang, but is happy that Niall and Alice are clearly getting serious. They’ve all decided to move in together next year, the flat and Louise, because Surrey accommodates for up to eleven people. Alice asks if Harry moving in with them wouldn’t be a problem for Louis, and Louis replies in the negative. 

“Why would it?” he asks, and Louise and Alice look at each other. Louis hates it when they do that. He throws a Maoam at Alice from across the table. “Oi!”

“Nothing, honestly. Just like, we know how close you guys are, and just thought, you know. What if his whole ‘slag phase’ doesn’t stop? We wouldn’t want you to get…”

Louis puts his hand up to stop them, shaking his head perhaps a bit _too_ ardently. “Whatever you’re about to say, forget it. It’s easy, I’ll just choose the room farthest from him. Let him be someone else’s problem. I still like him. If he wants to sleep with people, then he can. He’s an adult.” The girls nod sympathetically, but Louis doesn’t think they’re quite convinced, and perhaps just humouring him. Louis doesn’t know if he’s convincing himself, either.  
  
 

Boys’ night rolls around soon enough, and Louis is so fucking done by this point with his work, he decides he needs a _big break_. He and the girls go to Tesco to get drinks for tonight, them wanting to stock up on wine for their movie night. He buys a bottle of vodka and coke, and the Jade raises her brows at him.

“Don’t judge me, girl. I’ve had a long fucking term,” he says, raising a finger and Jade just kisses his shoulder and he puts his arm round her. They see Lucy at the checkouts and Alice and Louise go over to say hi, Jade and Louis staying back. She’s wearing no make-up, looking sniffly and her eyes are puffy, looking like a hamster with her hay-blonde hair lumped on the top of her head in a bobble.  
  
“Shit, wonder what’s wrong with her,” Jade whispers to Louis, and Louis is wondering the same thing, assessing the scene. When the girls give her a lingering hug and say goodbye, they watch her leave and then go over to where Jade and Louis are standing, having already paid.

“Harry said he doesn’t think they should see each other anymore,” Alice says, biting the inside of her cheek, brows pinched. No one looks at Louis.

“ _Why?_ ” asks Jade, crossing her arms.

Alice shrugs one shoulder. “Said he thought they should see other people.”

Jade scoffs, “‘See other people’. What a dick.” Alice and Louise nod, but Louis remains silent. He’d never really witnessed the repercussions of Harry’s whimsical decisions, always rolling his eyes at the way Harry was so flippant with who he saw, thinking it was impudent of him, but not that he was a massive arsehole. He thinks it’s because he never imagined the girls would be so upset themselves, when Harry was always totally fine after.

“It’s actually sociopathic, to have so little empathy like that.” Jade says, still ranting, and Louis had zoned out.

“Alright Jade, that’s enough,” Louis says, a weird sinking feeling in his stomach. Jade shakes her head but does quit, walking ahead with Alice and Louise as Louis purposefully stays back. He has seen a lot of sides to Harry; but he had never once thought that Harry could really have so little respect for the people he sleeps with, so as to not even feel remorse when his decisions cause someone to be so affected. He immediately feels rueful for letting himself fall for Harry’s stupid flirting. The dancing, the touches, the compliments. At least the girls got to have him, before they were left heartbroken, Louis wouldn’t even get that, would be left shattered without anything, when Harry finally got bored.

 

The girls all leave for Louise’s halls for the film night at around eight, kissing Louis on the cheek and giving him a hug, warning him not to get too drunk. Louis promises he won’t, but he knows it is his number one intention to get hammered. He thumbs a quick text to Matt, wishing him luck on the assignment he has due in, genuinely sad he won’t be able to see him tonight. They’d had sex twice now, the second time better sober, and Louis has a feeling that he might be able to see something for them. Though they both know it is still casual, he thinks he can entertain the idea of bringing him home to meet his mum, who had been pressing him for who this boy was that was tagged in a few of Louis’ Facebook photos.  
  
The boys meet for some pres, then head down at the club at around twelve. The club isn’t too busy tonight, which means drinks at the bar and quick and easy. They take it in turns to buy each other rounds, and Louis’s had so much tequila he thinks he could chunder at any minute. The dance floor isn’t too packed either, and it means everyone can find each other when they come back from the toilet. By far Louis’ favourite thing about tonight, however, is that Harry is giving the group, and more importantly, Louis, his undivided attention. There is no going off with people he’s just met to the smoking area or bar, or kissing anyone who pulls on his shirt or who he looks at the right way. They all spend the night dancing in a circle, bouncing up and down and shouting the lyrics, or for ones they don’t know, making them up.

Louis fans himself with his hand, the hot lights of the club making his mouth dry, and motions that he’s going to grab a glass of water to the lads. As he’s waiting in the four person line, tapping his foot and checking his fly is done up secretly, he sees a hand come to rest by him on the counter of the bar. Expecting it to be Harry in his classical sneaking up style, he turns to look to the face of the stranger, realising he doesn’t know him at all, and this guy is standing _way_ too closely for a randomer.

The guy notices Louis looking and smiles, and he’s not exactly bad looking, has nice black hair and a strong jawline, but Louis’s not really in the mood to pull tonight; this is a lads’ night and he’s perfectly content on the company as it is. He smiles back politely, and fixes his stare to the mirror behind the drinks cabinet behind the bar. His hair is still relatively in place and he thinks he looks quite good tonight, donning a tight black Hollister shirt, with white skinnies and his red converses, considering how little choice he had because he hasn’t done his laundry in about three weeks.  
  
He thanks the bartender and downs his water when he gets it, feeling like his head might explode with how much he’s drunk tonight. He feels a hand on his waist, the guy with the black hair, he drunkenly identifies, and squints at him.

“Alright, mate?” He asks, and Louis nods, before he spots the boys on the dance floor and walks towards them, not giving the guy even the briefest glance, or hint of goodbye. _Creep_.

The guy pulls his hand, and Louis stumbles back towards him, about to get really fierce because _who the fuck does he think he is?_ When he feels lips on his, rubbery and cold and it makes Louis’ stomach churn, especially with all the alcohol, but Louis feels weak, and his body feels like he really can’t move much, so he stays there, hands by his side and paralysed as the raven haired guy feels up and down his back, itching down to his arse.

He hears a cough beside him, and then the lips are removed. Louis blinks into what has happened. It’s Harry, and he’s having a word with the black haired guy, who is shorter than Harry, Louis thinks, amused. _Harry is so tall, isn’t he_? He smiles, dopily. The other guy puts his hands up, kind of like ‘he’s all yours’, or perhaps ‘I didn’t know’, Louis isn’t able to really tell. All he knows is, Harry puts a warm arm around his frame supporting his weight and escorts him to a nearby seating booth, where Louis sits down, face still hot and head hammering. Harry sits with him, arm around his shoulder, and gives him a brief kiss on the side of his head.

“Haz?” he asks, taking a drink of water that Harry is proffering, though he doesn’t know where or when he acquired it. He sips it gratefully.  
  
“Yeah?” Harry asks, voice close to his despite the pounding music from the dancefloor.  
  
“Who was that guy?”  
  
“Dunno,” Harry says softly, sound cutting through the thumping distant beats, stroking lightly up his arm, looking intently at Louis. “But he clearly can’t see when someone isn’t fucking interested in him."

Louis hugs him then, arms tight round his warm waist, heart growing at the way he can so easily bend himself to fit the grooves in Harry’s chest, to rest his heart near his head, to feel completely surrounded by Harry, like nothing can hurt him.  
  
“Thank you,” Louis whispers into his chest, but he doesn’t know how Harry can hear, as it’s so loud in there, and at that moment a group of girls walk past the booth screaming. He is faintly aware they didn’t actually _book_ a booth, and it’s likely they’ll be asked to move in a minute, but Louis will take what he can get.

“It's okay,” he hears Harry whisper into his hair. "I got you."

 

They get back to Richmond around half two, Louis having sobered up a lot, as he and Harry left early to get a Subway to absorb the alcohol. Louis’ sure he’s heard that food doesn’t really do anything of the sort, but he’s willing to believe it’ll make his belly feel more settled, anyway.  
  
Harry and Louis walk alone through the quiet campus, but Harry makes Louis laugh by playing the game ‘odds on’, which entails them taking it in turns to suggest a dare for the other person, then state the odds of the likelihood of them doing it. If they say the same number, the dare must be completed. It’s a really dumb game that Louis thinks massively disfavours the daree, but he can’t be too mad because Harry has just lost the game and has to leap over this huge puddle which he has no chance in actually doing. As predicted, he lands about a foot from the puddle’s shoreline, pissing mud all up his leg. The disgusted look on his face has Louis near crying with laughter.  
  
“Your go, H.” Louis says, opening the flat door to Flat 28. Harry comes in after, and they both go into the kitchen automatically instead of their rooms.  
  
“Alright, odds on you getting me and yourself a Bud from the fridge.” Easy.  
  
“1 in 3,” and they both say two, so Louis makes his way to the fridge and deposits them both a cold beer on the plastic table.  
  
“I don’t know how you’re stomaching drink,” Harry says, looking at him up and down. “You seemed wasted in the club when I saved you from that guy.”

“I feel better now, I dunno. I guess the whole thing sobered me up,” he laughs, a bit humourlessly.  
  
“Hm, I’ll bet.” He says after a beat, “Matt not coming over tonight?” Louis can’t help but notice it’s the first time he’s ever called him by his proper name, not ‘your boyfriend’ or deliberately mislabelling him.  
  
“Nah, think he’s probably asleep by now.” Matt didn’t reply to Louis’ last text, sent just after the whole incident with the black haired man, so he assumes he dropped off to sleep around then.

“Wetbag,” Harry says, and Louis flings out his arm, the back of his hand hitting him on the thigh, without any venom. Harry catches his hand and tangles their fingers together. Louis tries desperately not to let his mind get ahead of himself, but he can't help to romanticise the way Harry is circling his thumb on the back of Louis' hand.

“Why do you hate him so?” Louis asks, genuinely intrigued. He doesn’t know why Harry can be friends with _literally_ everyone in and outside of university but won’t make an effort with Matt, who Louis would widely consider generally harmless to all.  
  
“I don’t _hate_ him,” Harry says, cocking his head and squinting his eyes a bit, as if struggling to find the words he means. “Let’s just say we have… conflicting interests.”  He settles for, his smile growing wider. He lets go of their hands and he takes a sip of beer to perhaps school his grin a bit. Louis also drinks, the cold beverage a God send for his dry throat.  
  
“Do you want to talk in my room?” Louis asks then, because he doesn’t see the point in staying under the wan, yellow lights of the kitchen, would much rather hang out somewhere warmer, comfier, secluded.  
  
Harry piques one brow, giving him a half smile. “Trying to seduce me, Tomlinson?”  
  
Louis snorts, rolling his eyes. “You wish.”  
  
Harry barks out a laugh, “Pfft. You wish I wish.”  
  
“Shurrup, Harry.”

Harry follows him anyway.  
  
  
  
Although there’s a perfectly good bed there, they sit instead on the hard, carpeted floor, Louis’ back against the bed and Harry sits opposite him, head resting against the top of his desk, long legs stretched completely out, socked feet aside Louis’ thighs where he perches cross-legged. The desk light is on its lowest setting, sending a warm orange halo to bathe the room. Harry’s features soften under this illumination, his skin looking even more tanned and smooth, his lips deepening in their peony colour. They both bring drinks in, and Louis is encouraging them both to drink more, because he’s nervous, and he hopes to drink to the point where he’s not nervous anymore, but can’t seem to find when that threshold is. He is teetering over the top of the trenches, into no man’s land, no return. His movements get bolder, braver, his laughs louder, his words pointed and taunting, and Harry sends it right back his way. 

Being by themselves, and under the influence of a _lot_ of alcohol, they find themselves divulging things that Louis probably wouldn’t tell anyone, all because Harry asks. Louis thinks Harry could ask anything then, and he would tell him. He drowns the nagging voice in his head that reminds him that Harry is well-practised in getting people to do what he wants, tell them what he wants to hear, and Louis is just giving into him, but he can’t help it, doesn’t think he even minds. He thinks, solemnly, seriously, that in that moment he would let Harry take anything from him, as he bares all and surrenders everything that Harry wishes for.

They speak about Louis’ family, and Louis says that Lottie, his sister, had seen a post of him that Louis was tagged in and said she thought he was fit. He laughs then, before asking if she was single, before Louis smacks him, saying “actually shut up” and they both dissolve in a light fisticuffs, both vying for the last hit.

To Louis’ surprise, Harry is not this posh-Mancunian that Louis always envisaged. He’s actually from Cheshire, moving from there when he was quite small. He’s had a ‘series of dads’ (Harry’s own words) that left him, his mum and sister pretty scarred. Louis doesn’t think he’s ever heard him speak so earnestly, his eyes glistening in the hint of light which surrounds where they’re sitting. He says that two of them had cheated on his mum, even Rob, who Harry confessed was who he grew up with, who took him to watch the football, who he had entrusted to call his dad even though he wasn’t really.

“I guess family is more than just title and blood, innit?” He says, glumly. Louis nods, knowing this is true of his flat, how they have all grown so close after these few months, how they’re going to be moving in together soon, and how they’d already do anything for each other. Harry included. Louis thinks, as he takes in Harry under this soft light, biting his nails with his messy hair and Nike jumper, that he couldn’t ever bear to see him in pain, would vow to make him happy.

Louis swallows, thinking back to his mum’s exes, and knows the heart-breaking pain of watching his mum be left so hurt. He knows it hurts more when they would pretend they were okay, but in the loneliest moments, Louis would catch Jo crying.  
  
Perhaps Jade would be proud of his psychoanalysis, perhaps not, but he finds that instead of growing more resilient to that kind of behaviour like Louis did, Harry actually has leaned more towards it. He remembers this proverb he read once online, about the two children of alcoholics. One drinks a lot in his adult life, asking how could he not, because he saw his parents drink. The other abstained totally from drinking, and said how could he not, as he watched his parents drink. The same situation, two different perspectives. He thinks Harry is the former.  
  
“Do you reckon that’s why you’re... “ Louis doesn’t want to offend Harry, but he continues nevertheless, because he doesn’t know when he’ll have the chance to ask again. “Do you think that’s why you-”

“Fuck a lot of people?” Harry asks brazenly, chuckling and scratching the back of his head. Louis gulps, then nods, not seeing the logic in back-pedalling.  
“I guess. I dunno. I suppose it’s fucked me up, like. I guess my opinion on relationships is kind of… nil. Like, I just don’t see them lasting, because I physically haven’t _seen_ them lasting. But I guess I’m also jealous at the same time. I’d like to believe I can fall for someone, and someone fall for me, but…” he says, voice timid and his eyes wandering, like he couldn’t look Louis in the eye if he tried. “I dunno.” He says, voice resigned.

Louis reaches beside him and rests his hand on Harry’s leg, thumb making soothing circling motions, in a bid to let Harry knows he understands. He sees the corner of Harry’s lips lift.  
  
“I guess,” Harry starts, coughing a bit when he starts, then starting again stronger. “I guess that when you came out to us, I was really shocked, because I’ve never really known a gay person before, or like someone who was so… not sorry with that kind of thing. You know? Like back at home, I don’t reckon I could tell anyone anything like that.”

Louis stills, those words going around in his head, lodging into his skull and knocking around his brain. He didn’t know what he was trying to say. Harry couldn’t be gay… but could there be a chance he wasn’t the ruler-straight man that Louis had always portrayed him as? He makes an effort to continue the rubbing of his thumb, not wanting it to seem like he’s been so affected by Harry’s words.

“Is that what you meant the other day, then?” Louis asks, because he knows he’s treading a fine line here, because the beer has given him more confidence now.  
“When you said you were off with me because I was gay, but not _because_ I was gay?” Louis says, laughing at how much stupider it sounded drunk. “Because… because you feel that way a bit, too?” Louis asks timidly, because he doesn’t want to be the one to put words in Harry’s mouth but he needs to hear this.  
  
“I don’t know,” Harry lets out a breathy laugh, resting his weight on one hand and shrugging his shoulder. “I’m a man who knows what he likes,” and gives a sleazy smile, raising his eyebrows. Louis snorts at this.  
  
“You’re eighteen, you daft tart. How can you possibly know what you want? I bet you don’t even know what you want for breakfast most mornings.”  
  
“Actually, Lewis,” he says, pretending to push glasses up the bridge of his nose, “’M _nineteen_.”  
Louis waggles his hands, as if to say _big whoop._ Harry kicks him in the shin. “And I _do_ know what I like. It comes in aaaall shapes and sizes. But when I like something, I _really_ like something, you know?” Louis laughs, removing his hands and resting them on his thigh. He mocks how much Harry drags on his words when he’s drunk, speaking _sooo slowly_.  
  
“So… you’re what? Bi?” Louis pushes then, but what he’s really asking is _do I have a chance to be a notch on your bedpost would you ever be interested in me have you ever thought of me like that?_ He doesn’t know what good finding out the answers would do, just know that he needs to know them now. _  
__  
_ “Erm... I don’t think so. I dunno. I don’t really define myself as anything.” What a classic Harry Styles answer, Louis thinks, disgruntled, ever still unsure as he was before this conversation took place, many units ago.  
  
“Would you ever kiss a boy?” Louis asks, on a surge of confidence. He is playing with the carpet beneath his hands, looking for something to satisfy the itching desire he has to just touch Harry in any way he can. Harry still has his eyes closed, but he hears because he laughs, like he is being pestered.  
  
“Sure.” He says, lopsided grin on his face. Louis takes a swig from his bottle of Budweiser because he felt like he needed to gulp but didn’t want to seem really cliche and obvious. Harry really wasn’t giving away much, was he? This was like pulling teeth.  
  
“ _Have_ you kissed a boy, then?” and Louis doesn’t know if he’s coming across as too engrossed in Harry’s sex life, but after sharing a wall next to his room, he can safely say he is, whether he wanted to be or not, well-versed in Harry Styles having sex.  
  
“Yeah.” He says at that, looking at Louis with his head tilted back a bit on the desk, lids hooded. He could still see the greeny-blue of them. “At a party once. He sucked me off, actually. I didn’t ask him. I don’t remember his name.”  
  
Louis swallows at that, the total nonchalant delivery of it, trying not to act like this has affected him at all, but he thinks he falters a bit because he can feel elbows tremble where he rests on them.  
  
“Does that bother you?” Harry says then, and meets Louis’ eyes directly when Louis forgets to look away. And that… that changes something.    
  
Louis can’t put a finger on it, but the tone in the room has shifted. It’s silent, Louis can _hear_ the silence, hyper-aware of the lack of noise around him, or perhaps hyper-aware of there _being_ nothing around him, except Harry. His heart is racing and he can hear it in his ears, and Louis worries Harry might be able to hear it too, but then thinks he’s never heard someone’s heart from that distance. Then again, he’s not sure if their hearts have ever beat this fast.  
  
“Why would it?” He asks, like a challenge, trying to fake bravado but he is losing, because Harry won’t break eye contact so he has to, looking at the cover of a textbook next to Harry’s hand.  
  
“‘Cause you’re shaking,” Harry quips back, looking straight through him like he’s glass. Like glass, he also shatters.  
  
“‘M not.” he says -splutters - rolling his eyes like it’s the most ridiculous thing he’s ever heard, but he knows he’s been caught lying.  
  
“Do you know what Stalin did when he learnt the Germans were invading, when Hitler broke the Nazi-Soviet pact during World War II?” Harry says, leaning forward.

 _What?_ He had imagined more romantic sentence starters. “Kicked their arses?”

“Before that. Do you know what the Soviets did, when they were faced with a challenge?”

Louis shakes his head, not sure where this is going.

“They retreated, burnt all the ground before the Nazis could even get there to seize anything.”

“What’s your point?” Louis asks, directly.

“My point is… you’re Stalin.”

Louis grasps his chest, mock-outraged. “Bloody hell, Harold. I’m a bit stubborn sometimes, but I’m not a bloody paranoid-”

“No… think about it. When faced with a challenge, with someone pushing you to do something, backing you in a corner, to react, you go backwards. You back out.” Harry’s looking at him intently, like any of this makes sense, because he knows Harry means him, he knows Harry is talking about them, yet he cannot understand how any of Louis’ actions were considered reactionary.

“Do you think maybe the reason why Stalin resisted Hitler’s… advancements… was because he knew that the Nazis would waste their time and chase after the Soviet land anyway?”

Harry smirked at this, shaking his head. “Perhaps. Perhaps.” A beat of silence, measured by the mountainous beat of Louis’ heart. _So go ahead_ , Louis thinks. _Be territorial._  
  
“Do you like it on top or below?” Harry asks suddenly, like that’s what they were talking about, like it didn’t come from nowhere, and his voice is deep, like, deeper than Louis has ever heard it, and he’s so fucking drunk but he will follow the end of this no matter what.  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“You know- do you like taking control, or do you prefer having someone be in charge?” The mood has changed so fast, Louis feels like he gets whiplash, but he’s seeing a side of Harry, with this fun, sexually-charged energy, and he’s been dying to have a tester of it, so he doesn’t want to back down now.  
  
Louis laughs, raising his eyebrows. “I don’t know what you’re asking me.” Lie.  
  
“Yes, you do.”  
  
Louis shakes his head incredulously, running a hand through his hair. “I don’t know, Harry.”  
  
“I like to be in control,” Harry says, then, and that - that stays in the room for a long time. Louis doesn’t know what to say, because he’s drunk and he came out for a good time and now Harry is telling him what he already fucking knows, what he’s already heard, and it confirms everything, and he is madly lustful with what Harry is saying.  
  
“So I’ve heard,” Louis says, bravely.  
  
Harry laughs animatedly, “What have you heard? Who told you what?” Louis smiles at that: Harry not realising that Louis meant _physically fucking hears it through the wall_ as opposed to being gossiped to about it.  
  
“Nothing,” Louis smirks, liking that this has taken a turn for the better and now it is _Harry_ who squirms with something he’s not being told.  
  
“Go on, tell us,” he says, pushing his socked foot onto Louis’ chest gently. Louis swipes it away.  
  
“Fuck off. And no, a gentleman never tells.”  
  
“You are no gentleman, Louis Tomlinson,” Harry says lowly, pushing both feet this time into his thighs and Louis grabs them.  
  
“I resent that, you bitch,” Louis giggles, lurching forward to grab Harry’s legs, finding himself sitting astride on his feet so Harry can no longer continue kicking. Harry laughs, lifting his legs up so Louis falls forward, shifting down on Harry’s legs, his hands bracing himself on Harry’s chest, nearly on his lap. He can feel his big hands digging hard into Louis’ hips above his black shirt, where Harry had stopped him from falling off sideways. Louis quickly tugs on Harry’s hair in a payback attempt for the kicks, and Harry’s head goes with it, letting out an “ _ah”_ and then grabbing Louis’ wrists tight between his own, holding them tight to his chest in an unbreakable grip. Louis tries to rock himself backwards to escape, but Harry drags him back to him, even closer than they were before.  
  
Their noses are a few inches away from each others’, and this close Louis feels Harry’s heaving, shaky breaths, sees his nostrils flaring, smells his aftershave, explores the tiny hairs above his lips.  
  
Something breaks, Louis can almost hear it.  
  
Harry doesn’t say anything, but he leans forward and kisses Louis then, and Louis has his eyes wide open in shock. Harry shuts his though, eyebrows pinching in the middle, gasping between one hard kiss to the next, and all Louis can focus on is the sound of their lips parting loudly, Harry breathing loudly through his nose, the sensation of Harry’s tongue trying to pry his lips open, and the soft moan when he succeeds. All the while he holds Louis’ wrists, then lets them slip so he can hold his hands, instead. All Louis can do is stare, because he doesn’t think he has ever seen something so beautiful in his life.  
  
Harry pulls back after a little while, eyes still closed, burying his face in the side of Louis’, his nose nuzzling his jaw. Louis cannot comprehend what he is feeling now, wouldn’t even know where to start, feeling tipsy and euphoric and horny, with some traces of guilt starting to creep in all at the same time.

“Fuck, I-” he breathes, leaving wet kisses on Louis’ neck, which Louis can’t help but moan into. He doesn’t know what’s wrong or right anymore, hasn’t even had the chance to think about it yet.  
  
“I know,” Louis breathes, and Harry moans, fingers pulling at hair at the back of his head, pushing him further into the crevice of his neck.  
  
“I’ve wanted this for ages…” Harry rushes out, and spreads his hands on Louis’ arse, grabbing fistfuls as he grinds Louis into him. At this, a small, high whine falls from Louis’ mouth from the back of his throat, one that he didn’t even know he was capable of.

Harry growls in response, forcing Louis to rub against him again. “You like that, huh? Huh, yeah?” Louis nods, desperately. “Yeah… You fucking _love_ that,” he says through clenched teeth, and Louis doesn’t think Harry knows what he’s saying anymore, he looks fucking crazed. Harry goes back to kissing him, and it’s all tongue and teeth, opening Louis’ mouth and just _taking_ , hands running up and down his body, but always ending back on Louis’ bum, like he can’t get enough.  
  
“Lie down,” Harry orders, nose to nose with Louis, forcing his gaze. All Louis has in his mind is 1) how good this feels and 2) how surreal it is that what he is used to hearing from behind a wall is being whispered into his ear. Before Louis can comply, Harry goes back to his neck and begins sucking hard, biting down and licking over it, so that Louis hisses in pain. That makes Harry grab his wrists in an iron grip; he leans forward to lay Louis on the floor, pinning his hands above his head, pushing his weight onto Louis’ lithe frame, covering his entire body, rutting down.

Harry gives Louis a particularly bruising bite. “Fuck, ah! Stop,” but Louis may as well not have a voice at all, because Harry looks so determined that he’s not sure if he can even _hear_ Louis. He has to physically pull Harry by his hair to get him to listen.

When Louis manages to separate his lips from his neck, Harry looks absolutely _gone_ , his head tilted back in the way Louis is pulling, mouth agape and wet, eyes glassy as he looks beneath his lashes at Louis. “What?” he asks, breathily.

“No marks,” he says, and Harry narrows his eyes.

“Why no marks?” Harry asks, letting go on one of Louis’ hands so he can drag it down his sternum, reaching the bottom of his shirt and lifting slowly.

Louis doesn’t want to explain it now, because he know that this happy, buzzed drunk feeling will soon turn into a depressed and humiliated wasted feeling and that’s the worst, but he knows he needs to mention it anyway.

“Matt.” Louis says, and hope that says enough.

“What? Forget _that_ , I _hope_ he sees this.” He says, kissing him again, and it looks like he’s getting off on that idea, because he begins circling his hips again in an infuriatingly good manner. “ _Want_ him to. Doesn’t own you, does he, Lou?” Another bite, softer this time. “Tell him he should be more of a man next time and mark you up himself, before I get to you,” he says lasciviously and laughs against his skin, before putting his lips back on the spot on his neck he was just working. It reminds Louis of Harry a few months back, when he used to try and annoy him by saying “tell your boyfriend so and so…”. Louis’ gut twists at how things have become so complicated since then.

Louis pries him away again, this time by pushing his cheek aside. “Harry,” he says, and Harry releases a big, obnoxious sigh, sitting on his knees above Louis. “This has nothing to do with him _being a man_. Fucking hell, Harry, I’m not a spot for you to piss on. I think it would hurt his feelings if he found out. I don’t wanna hurt him. I feel… I think this… might be wrong,” he motions between the two of them.

Harry waits, and has his eyebrows raised incredulously, like he doesn’t believe Louis is being reasonable at all, worrying his lip. He look so beautiful and alluring, within literal arm’s reach, that Louis hates himself for not just following his carnal instincts and capitulating to him.    
  
Finally, Harry raises his hands, and says, “fine.” He removes Louis from his lap carefully, collecting his hoodie from the floor and stands up, making for the door. Louis can see he is wiping his lips with the back of his arm. Before he reaches the door though, he turns around.

“You didn’t think this was wrong a moment ago,” his voice is quiet; it wavers. He clears his throat.

Louis doesn’t reply, only looks at his clasped hands in his lap.

Harry sighs, and for the first time, Louis thinks he senses vulnerability in Harry. It makes Louis look at him. Harry pushes his hair off his face after Louis had messed with it, just moments earlier. It’s a stinging reminder.  
  
“Why would you...  forget it,” he said, waving his hand, resolution in his tone, a sense of giving up which made Louis’ heart ache, as if Louis wasn’t even worth the bother. He left the room before Louis had a chance to get up off the floor. 

After two minutes of stunned silence, Louis crawls into his own bed, and let months of built-up tears fall. He cries for himself, for the way Harry treated him, for the way he treated Harry, for Matt, for the guilt, for his cowardice. He cries harder, remembering that Harry in his bed, next to him, against the same wall, only a few inches away, and yet he might as well be the other side of the world.

Louis doesn’t see Harry for a few days after that, not even emerging shirtless from the bathroom, or at dinner when they all gather to watch Love Island. The girls do question it, as well as Niall and Alex, but Louis insists he doesn’t know. And that’s the truth, he really doesn’t know where he is, and Louis can’t help but feel it’s his fault. Matt also texts him a few times in those days, but all Louis can do is reply a ‘I’m okay’ in return, and make feeble excuses for not being able to go out with him. He feels immensely guilty, though knows that what he did was not terrible. He still feels like that cannot make a representation to Matt which suggests that Louis had not been kissing Harry and rubbing against him just a few days ago, as then he will be a liar and thus feel guiltier. He also does not particularly want to divulge to Matt what happened, not seeing a point in jeopardising their friendship for a pointless, fruitless night.  
  
The only problem is, however, that the flat had arranged a night out before the whole kissing incident had occurred, and Louis had promised he would go. It was supposed to be an end of term get together; a last drink with each other before they headed separate ways for the Holidays.  
The whole day leading up to it, however, had Louis in fits of nerves. Every time he walked down the corridor, to the bathroom or kitchen for example, or along to his lessons, he couldn’t help but feel he might bump into Harry. This led him to walking with his eyes surgically attached to his phone at all time outside the privacy of his own room, so as to provide distraction in case he did.

Further to the fact that Louis had not seen Harry, he had also not received any texts or Snapchats from him either. Granted, Louis had also not sent any, but usually Harry was the first person to text him at lunch asking if he were around, and if he wanted to have lunch with him and his course mates. The absence of texts on his phone from him should not have made Louis feel as empty as it did.

 

He does early predrinks with Liam and Alex, in a bid to make himself calmer in case Harry did turn up tonight. They sit in the kitchen listening to The Greatest Showman soundtrack because for some reason, Liam had been left in charge of the music and he insisted on musical soundtracks and old big band songs. Louis doesn’t have it in him to complain though, instead making a rule in his head to sip every time a long note reverberates out of the speakers on Liam’s phone. By the time Never Enough ends, he is effectively pissed. _Does every song have to be so bloody sad?_ He wonders, playing with with the rim of his glass.

The rest of the flat trickle in in drabs, with Alce, Jade and Louise coming in after getting ready together, and then Henry coming in with a pack of cards and bottles of Coke and rum under his arm. They begin to play a match of Ring of Fire, much to the complaints of Alice, but Henry is much less considerate than Niall and promises her that she’ll have fun and get drunk. Niall eventually does come in, telling Liam  to “get this shit off” as he plugs his phone into his speaker bar he bought into the kitchen and begins blaring Ariana Grande. They all get progressively more drunk and the noise is really loud now, everyone laughing and shouting over each other, but Louis can’t help but keep checking his phone, noting how it’s just gone ten o’clock and Harry’s not even turned up for pres.

Just as they’re getting ready to leave for the bar, the girls getting into their heels and everyone getting their coats because it had become so much colder recently, the door bursts open, and Harry trips in, steadying himself by bracing a hand on the wall of the kitchen, clearly completely gone with drink and God knows what else, judging by his state. His hair, usually effortlessly pushed back, is left in strands across his eyes, forehead looking clammy, a woozy smile on his face like everything was hilarious. Everyone looks at him, and Alex shouts “Harry, you cunt, why are you late?!” before grasping him in a hug.  
  
Behind him in the doorway, Louis failed to notice a girl, who meets the typical requirements of all of Harry’s. She’s tall and tan, blonde hair impossibly straight, with big blue eyes and full lips. She’s giggling at the entrance he just made, clasping onto his hand, and Louis feels sick. He feels sick because he has been in her position, and she has no fucking clue how it will inevitably end. Feels sick because he’ll have to listen to them tonight, and it will kill him. Most of all, he just feels so fucking _stupid_ because these last few days, he believed Harry was actually having some kind of emotional response, like Louis was, because of what had happened. Now, he can clearly see, if her arm around his waist now is anything to go by, he spent it dicking into someone else.

Louis doesn’t want to speak to him, or meet his eye, or even be around him. In fact, if it weren’t for everyone else shoving him out the door for the bar, claiming how 2-for-1 drinks are going to end if they don’t hurry, he would not bother going. He can think of a thousand things he’d rather do more than watch the way Harry has his arm round this girl as they walk in front of him, touching her all over with absolutely no shame, and he hates her for laughing into it. _The fucking idiot_ , he scowls, bitterly, because she clearly thinks she is so wonderful to deserve Harry’s attention. She clearly has no idea that he tries it with everyone, even men apparently. Even Louis. All for his entertainment. Alex is trying to keep up with Harry and his new girl, and so is Henry and Liam and Louis also kind of hates them too, though he knows he’s not being fair because they have no clue about Louis and Harry.

He tries to busy himself with the conversation that Niall and the girls are having, deciding who should buy the cocktails for two of them to make it cheaper, and it is all just nonsense in Louis’ head.

 

The night, as Louis imagines, is shit. Halfway through the night, as Alice and Niall and Harry and Blonde Girl are dancing on the bar’s dance floor, Louis waits glumly at the bar, getting more and more hammered and is not inclined to stop until he reaches the point where he doesn’t care that Harry is over there paying no mind to Louis as if he doesn’t exist, dancing dirtily with some girl.  
  
The night, however, as Louis does _not_ envisage, ends abysmally. The door opens as Louis is drinking himself into a sorry grave alone at the bar, and in walks Matt, who Louis had told he wasn’t going out. He’s with the Vice President of Language, who Louis gives a small wave to, and a girl Louis briefly recognises from his Language class. Matt approaches him, giving him a quick hug and pulls back with a confused look.

“Hey Lou, thought you were gonna finish your essay tonight?” he asks, Southern English drawl coming out, sounding a bit hurt. Louis scratches his neck, looking away.

“I was, yeah, but I actually got the date wrong. Ends up, it’s next week, the due date.” Matt nods, looking like he doesn’t know how anyone with a brain cell could forget the due date of an important essay, and Louis is also inclined to agree, because he doesn’t know how either. Still, the bar gets busier so he and Matt and forced closer together, and his hand rests on Louis’ back, so he can’t be too mad at him.

“Let me buy you a drink,” says Matt, and Louis should protest because he does not want anything from Matt, cannot take anything from Matt after the other night with Harry. As he’s about to do so, he feels a jolt from Matt being shoved into him by someone next to them at the bar. Matt makes a hurt sound immediately, the culprit’s drink spilled a bit on him with the force.  Louis turns his eyes, furiously, to see who’s enough of a dick to do something like that. He spots Harry, pushing past a crowd to get back to the dancefloor, two drinks in hand, acting as if nothing had happened at all.  
  
Louis is about to console Matt, but when he looks into his face, Matt looks _terrifying_ ; he looks as if he is about to kill. His lips are upturned and his eyes are narrowed in on where Harry is making his way back to the dance floor, back to the group. Matt closes the distance between them in about four strides, grabbing onto the back of Harry’s shirt by the neck and pulling him backwards. Harry goes immediately down, probably wouldn’t have if he weren’t so plastered. His drinks spill over his lap and it takes him a few visible seconds on the floor to recognise what has happened.

“Don’t ever fucking push me again,” Louis thinks he hears Matt say, and Louis has literally _never_ heard anything nasty come out of his mouth, but this sounds positively venomous. He’s obviously caused quite a scene, and so he looks around, perhaps now realising where he is, and makes sure he doesn’t think Harry is going to hurt him back, before he jogs back to Louis, leaving Harry there on the floor.

“‘M sorry, Lou. He’s just never been nice to me and that was the last straw.” He’s still got whatever red thing Harry was drinking down his white shirt, adrenaline causing him to breathe heavily and not be quite coherent.

He’s suddenly pushed into the bar, head hitting the counter with the force, Harry there behind him, nostrils flaring, looking wet and drunk and pathetic. 

“No, Harry!” Louis screams, but Harry can’t hear him, smashing the side of Matt’s face with his fist. He’s tackled by the bouncers forcefully, who drag him away and kick him outside, telling him to get lost. Louis looks onto the dancefloor, where the entire flat have gone to see if they’re okay, a few people checking on Harry outside also. Liam and Niall say they’re going to walk him back. The girl Harry bought is looking embarrassed and leaves without saying bye to anybody.

Louis cannot believe what he’s physically just seen, in total shock as he watches the bar staff attempt to cotton swab the bit of blood that has dribbled out onto the side of Matt’s face. At the end of it, when Matt waves off any mention of the police being called, Louis walks him home, back to his flat. He gives him a kiss, looking into his kind eyes, and puts a hand to his cheek, the cut on the side managing to have clotted and closed. He leaves him at the entrance, having promised to see him tomorrow, and walks back to Richmond halls, wondering how the fuck the end to this term has managed to be so, so awful.

   
  
Louis awakens to the sound of banging at his door. He panics, sitting up and wondering if he’d overslept, before realising it’s a weekend. Then the hangover washes over him like paint pours. He checks his phone and sees it’s actually 4pm, and _shitting hell how did I sleep that long?_  
  
The knocking is still insistent, so Louis wraps his dressing gown around him and opens the door.

It’s Harry.

His eyes are sunken in, his usually dewy skin looking pale and dry, his bottom lip split and the dry bloodied crack makes Louis’ insides churn.  
  
It all floods back to him, yesterday, the fight, the kiss, all of it. He fucking hates him right now, is the thing, can barely think to look at him. But Harry is there, looking angry at _him_ , and simply stands there as Harry shoves his way past him, into Louis’ room, before spinning around.

Louis shuts the door behind him, knowing this has every potential to be explosive.

“Your fucking boyfriend owes me an apology.” Louis has never wanted to punch someone more than this fucking entitled, arrogant arsehole.

“He doesn’t owe you _shit_. You owe him an apology, it’s a surprise he didn’t fucking finish you off then and there, the way you pushed him.” Harry sneered, shaking his head like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

Louis continued, “Is that really all you came in here for? To tell me my friend owes you an apology?”

“Oh, so he’s your friend now?” Harry says, sarcasm lacing his tone.  
  
“Don’t act like you’re so surprised. I know you’re not used to your advances being slowed, Harry, but you really should let that one go.” Harry laughs loudly, no humour in it at all.  
  
“My ‘ _advances being slowed’_. Are you hearing yourself? _You_ let me kiss you, you fucking _arsehole_. You let me, you didn’t stop me, you kissed me back, even! You invited me to your room, encouraged me to drink more, then straddled me.” He speaks slowly, like Louis is an imbecile, and it boils his blood. “What the fuck did you _think_ we were doing, Louis? Hm? Playing chess or summat? Take some God damn responsibility! You’re meant to be the adult here.”

“That’s crazy. You’re crazy. How the fuck have you turned this around to be _my_ fault? I invited you to my room that night because you were my friend, you idiot!,” he retaliates, pushing Harry back. How can Harry even _insinuate_ that what Louis had done by merely _not_ pushing Harry away was tantamount to initiating it in the first place?

“No. No, fuck you. This… _thing”_ he spits, motioning with his hand between Louis and himself, “it’s been going on for months now. You know as well as I, friends don’t do what we did.”

“What _you_ did,” Louis growls. Harry looks furious, and for a moment, Louis is actually scared.

“You-” Harry seethes, and steps forward, baring his teeth. “You _kissed me back_! Or are you forgetting that? Are you forgetting the talks we had that night, prancing around the fact that you wanted me to make a move? Did you not think I could tell? You all but fucking said it.” Louis hates him most, because he knows what he is saying is true, and he hates himself for it. Louis wants to push Harry though, wants to see how far he will bend till he breaks, and almost hopes Harry will say something that Louis can never forgive, just so he can have a real reason to hate him. “You wanted me to make a move, so I made one.” He said, finality to his voice.

Louis doubles at this. “Is that the only reason then? You kissed me because you got the _impression_ I wanted you to?”

“ _No_ ,” Harry stresses, rubbing the lines in his forehead away with his thumb and finger. “Stop that, you’re acting like a brat. I’m saying that you can’t just now treat me like shit because I did something like that, you can’t make me feel like I took advantage of you, like I’m some kind of home wrecker between you and Matt. You can’t throw the Matt situation back in my face when the _whole time_ you had said to me that you weren’t even _dating_. What the fuck am I meant to think of that?”

“You heard us have sex, not a week ago!” Louis shouts, exasperated.

“Yeah, _sex!_ Not get fucking _married_. Louis,” he says, breathing heavily, eyes wide, looking like he’s taking every effort to calm himself. “Lou. If you had really felt that way about him, why didn’t you say it then, huh? Not pull my hair and whine into my fucking mouth.”

“How about, ‘because your tongue was down my throat’?” Louis says, crossing his arms, but he knows Harry has a point.

“Stop being so fucking petty. You’re pissing me off now. Yes, I knew you guys were casual, but you gave me absolutely _no sign_ that you were anything more than that. You are trying to blame me because you can’t bear the thought that you might have actually done something wrong, Louis.”  
  
“You don’t think him being round all the time, going to Karaoke, to the pub on Fridays with us, for board games, you don’t think that was indicative of us being ‘ _something more’_?”

“Not when you spend the whole time looking at me.”

Louis couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Louis scoffed, turning away, before Harry caught his arm.

“Why lie, Louis, then? Hm? I don’t get it, I asked you, so many times, in so many words and you always told me the same thing: he is not my boyfriend. Why lie? Because I’m starting to think it was to keep me making an effort, thinking you were single.”

“You conceited- Like you would’ve backed off anyway if you knew I was taken!”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks, shouting in his face.

Louis looks up at him and knows that what he is about to say, he will live to regret. “I’m sorry, Harry. I forgot,” he says coolly, looking him dead in the eye, venom in his voice, and he hates how nasty he has feels, “you only know sex. Nothing more. Poor Harry and his little sob story. You literally can only comprehend sex and are incapable of feeling anything else”. Louis can’t stop his mouth running, and then there comes a point where he sees the futility in stopping, because there _is_ no coming back from this.  
  
“How about this, Harry? Some hard-hitting truth for you. Why don’t you stop trying to fuck everything that moves, and maybe someone _would_ love you? You move on so quickly from one person to the next; what’s there to love about that? You’re clearly so fucking _immune_ to love, so _incapable_ , you wouldn’t see it if it were right in front of you.”

When Louis finishes, his chest is rising and falling with exertion. He feels himself welling up, but he doesn’t want to show Harry, so he tries to blink it away. He feels his throat tightening, and he’s scared to speak in case it cracks. Harry, meanwhile takes all of it in, pelted with the hateful words, like a dog used to the beating of his master. All with a cold, stony expression.

Louis waits, waits for a punch, because he thinks he deserves one.  
  
“Is that how you feel? Really?” is all Harry says, his voice croaky but levelled, and Louis doesn’t think he will ever forget the way it sounded, the tugging of his lips into a hard frown, and his expression betrays the indifference he’s trying to get across.  
  
_No._ Louis wanted to say. _No_ , he wanted to scream. He wanted to fall down at Harry’s legs and hug them and tell him he was so, so sorry. All he can think is _those lips that are trembling now, they kissed me_.  
  
Instead, he says “Yes. It is.”  
  
Harry nods, his tongue feeling around his teeth, and eventually shrugs. He doesn’t even bother to cast a single look at Louis as he walks out the door.

 

  
Louis books the first train back to Doncaster that evening. It’s a 06:32, but Louis thinks that’s good, because less chance of bumping into Harry or anyone who emerges from his door. He’d decided this after having had a rather emotional, yet evasive, chat with Zayn about how it’s all fallen to shit here, and he can afford to miss a few lectures because next week is when they break up for Christmas. 

“Can’t you just… wait it out, Lou?” asks Zayn down the phone, and Louis pinches the bridge of his nose, wanting to cry, because he is so fucking stressed but he can’t say a word, not when there’s so much to tell, not when he’s so close to just coming home and forgetting all about it. To retell it now would be to rip the plaster off the wound.

“No, Zayn. Trust me, I can’t. This is more than I can bear.”

“Alright mate. Alright. Just come home, yeah?” he says, in his gruff Yorkshire lilt, and it’s all the persuasion Louis needed.

When Louis finally turns his phone back on, he’s on his mum’s sofa, fingering the frame of the screen for ages before deciding _fuck it_. Immediately, he gets an influx of texts, thankful for his phone being on silent. After being home for a couple of days, it seems perhaps everyone has started to realise he wasn’t there for their ritualistic Love Island binging, or any drinking sessions he may have missed.

**Niall: where r u dude? Havent seen you in ages!! If ur still in your room den come out and talk to me!! Text back… miss you x  
  
**

**Jade: Iya babe, haven’t seen you in a while, hope you haven’t gone home without hugging me goodbye! Xxxx  
  
**

**Alex: orite mate, Liam reckons youve gone home, just wondering if that’s true? If not, still on for karaoke this weds?  
  
**

The ones that makes his stomach really sink are from Matt.

**Matt <3: Hey Lou, sorry about last night. Can’t believe I dragged Harry back… he just really got me annoyed after all of that shit**

**Matt <3: Lou? I’m sorry :(**

Louis clears the rest of the messages, because the guilt is fucking killing him. And he doesn’t know what to do with the realisation that he is sad because he has nothing from Harry, no texts or snapchats, and not because he’s let Matt worry about him and ignored him. He doesn’t know how to reconcile that in his head, because it means more than Louis can let it mean. It manifests emotions and caring about Harry, and Louis can’t deny it anymore, and he just tucks his legs up and cries into his knees, wrapping his arms around his legs. _I’ve fucked everything up, haven’t I? The people I care about I lose, and those who care about me, I can’t show them an ounce of respect._  
  
He’d become a stranger to Harry, how could he let that happen? Because he knows with total certainty that even if Harry didn’t talk to him again, Harry would still be Louis’ boy. Louis would still love him. That’s who he is to him, it is a fact which cannot be altered. He is totally, completely enamoured by him. He couldn’t do wrong if it killed him. Louis hates himself for what he’s said. He’s been so _dumb,_ to trick Harry into thinking he was interested then throwing it in his face when he only did what Louis wanted.

He has to phone Matt right then and there, telling him everything, the kiss and the fight and the mistakes, and how Louis could never really give him his heart, and he deserves better. All the while, it feels like a dagger to his chest, letting yet another person down. Matt, testimony to his angelic nature, soothed him, actually _comforted him_. It ends up Matt was quite interested in something with the Vice President of the Language Society, though he was sad to hear Louis’s changed his mind. He promises Louis he’s not deceived him, and Louis is so overwhelmed that he cries asleep down the phone to him, to the promises it would be okay, that he was okay.  
  
The entire Christmas term, Louis doesn’t receive anything from Harry. He sees him in Snapchats, until that is too much, to see his random insights in his stories that are no longer just for Louis’ ears anymore. He sees his replies on the Flat’s group chat, happy replies and silly bantering, but it cuts Louis deep to see him okay. It hurts that they don’t talk. It hurts that he’s heart-broken, just like he always knew he would be. He knows he owes Harry an apology, but he knows he deserves the pain, he deserves to be ostracised like this, knows Harry is so much more popular so he’d never be the one to suffer from their not being friends. He will take the brunt of it, because it’s the least he deserves. So after a while, even the group chat is too much, and soon he has no contact with anyone from university, stops doing his reading, instead choosing to slump around with Zayn with a spliff, spends all the rest of his time helping Jo take care of the kids, because it makes him happier, even just for a while, before he has to go back to the reality.

  
It’s January, and his mum’s just pulled off the A331, checking her rearview before pulling into Richmond’s car park, pulling up a few feet before his block, as he takes his suitcase out the car and gives her a kiss on the cheek, thanking her for the lift. She pets him on the arm, telling him she loves him and at that he nearly cries. He’s definitely not ready to face his second term at university. He repeats it back and watches her reverse and drive away, heart heavy. He faces the door, bracing himself, before letting himself in.  
  
By the time he's climbed the millions of stairs, everybody’s already inside in the hallway, catching up about their Christmas Holidays, Alex bragging how he’d been to Ypres all month, and Louis struggles not to roll his eyes. Jade runs up to him and kisses his cheek when she sees him, and they hug for a full minute, a secret conversation of _are you ok? I’m fine. I was worried about you._ They let each other go and he greets everyone else, handing out kisses and hugs and _how are you_ s. He does spot Harry in the background, cross-armed, and knows he’s definitely seen Louis arrive. Louis isn't sure whether to just hug him, debating whether this should be the first step, but before he can properly consider it, he finds Harry has busied himself with his phone, trying to look obviously engrossed in whatever he's reading. By the time Louis makes his way around the circle, Harry has effectively communicated that he definitely does not want a hug from Louis. It’s a hard pill to swallow, but he does it anyway, because he’s reminded of his mum and how she wouldn’t want to see him sad. He's reminded of his family, and he knows he's stronger than this. He doesn't feel like it, he doesn't want to, his heart is contorting and his throat is constricting, but he can take the punch.

They spend the first night getting drunk in the flat kitchen, music loud on Henry’s speaker, and playing games. It’s good to be back, but Louis can’t help but feel the awkwardness suffocating him. They literally pretend each other don’t exist, don’t look each other’s way, except for the odd sneaking peek that Louis manages, noting that Harry’s had his hair cut and that he still looks unfairly beautiful. Harry still talks to everyone else, and it seems no one has noticed something is even up, and it makes Louis sad to know that Harry clearly isn't as cut up as Louis feels.  
  
Eventually they all start packing up at about twelve o’clock saying goodnight and giving hugs, all except Louis. Louis stands there, and watches Harry grab his grey knit cardigan from the back of his chair, ready to go to bed, looking rushed to not be the last one left in the room with Louis. He doesn’t want that. He can’t stand this anymore. He can’t lose any more of Harry than he already has. All he can do is try. And it will hurt when he is rejected again, and it will sting, but Louis must try.  
  
He goes up next to him, as most people have left the room except Jade who is grabbing a Chee-String from her shelf in the fridge and Henry who’s packing up his charger and speaker. Harry, meanwhile, is steadfastly pretending Louis does not exist.

“Harry,” he whispers, heart thumping out of his chest. His fingers go to rest on Harry’s forearm and the touch is charged. Literally, they both get a static shock. Harry looks at Louis, eyebrow raised in a very confused fashion, as if he could not genuinely envision any situation where Louis would have need to talk to him. He looks as if he doesn’t even fucking _recognise_ Louis. Louis thinks he’s lost him for good.  
  
“Please may I speak to you?” He’s never asked for something so formally in his life, let alone to Harry, who would usually mock anything that came out of Louis’ mouth, let alone something a bit posh.  
  
Harry’s mouth is in a tight-line, looking wholly unamused, bothered, impatient. He stiffly nods to it though, and waits for the others to leave, saying goodnight to Henry as he shuts the door behind him.

“What is it?” Harry asks, playing with his nails. Louis checks no one is left in the room, before taking a deep breath, and jumping off the edge, hoping he will land on his feet.

“I wanna say first that I’m - I’m really sorry. Okay, like the things I said to you that night, I cannot ever take back. And though you might not show it, or want to show it, I have a feeling they may have hurt you. And that is what is killing me, because I hurt you, though that night when we kissed, I promised myself that I couldn’t hurt anyone like you. I promised myself I’d protect you from something like that. But I just… I fucking let myself and you down. You _do_ deserve love. Bloody hell, H, if anyone does, it’s you. You’re perfect, to me, to everyone.” A chill runs up his arms, and he doesn’t know if it’s wise to bare this much of himself just to be rejected, but he figures he has come this far.    
  
He continues, “remember when I said you wouldn’t know love if it stood right in front of you? Well, I meant that - ”  
  
Harry furrowed his brow, affronted and says ”I don’t really see why you’ve come here, Louis, if just to rub it in my face that I’m unlove-”  
  
Louis raises his palm to placate him. “Wait. I didn't- I mean, that’s what I’m doing now. I want to _let_ you know. I want you to realise, that love _is_ standing right in front of you, and it just didn’t have the guts to tell you until now. I _do_ love you Harry,” Harry’s eyes close then, his bottom lip trembling, and he feels like it’s saying to Louis _please don’t do this_. Louis takes a deep breath and proceeds.  
  
“I love your person, and your thoughts, and your smart-ass comments. I love how beautiful you are, inside and out. I love how passionate you get about everything, and how much you make me laugh, and how _easy_ it is to be with you. I love how you make people feel like they can be themselves, and you treat that person as if they deserve all the attention in the world. And I think I could be _in_ love with you, even… I just know that I wouldn’t be anything without you. That month apart, hearing nothing from you, I know that now. Without you, I’m nothing. I’m sorry for the stupid things I’ve done.”

Harry looks at him, and he looks sad, beaten, downtrodden, and Louis doesn’t know how he’s managed to wrangle someone so badly, someone he swore to himself he’d never hurt. He almost doesn’t want to say any of this, because he feels like he’d be tricking Harry, when his heart is so pure, and Louis’ just isn’t. Louis feels like he's patching a quilt up with tape, knowing it won't last. He can't help but feel his efforts aren't enough anymore.   
  
He doesn’t know what more to say to him, but he can’t just say nothing, he can’t just walk out the door and leave this. If Harry left, he’d take half of Louis with him, and he wouldn’t even realise it. The empty side of him would starve away, waiting for his return. He couldn’t hear Harry being with anyone who wasn’t him, who didn’t adore him like Louis did. He thought he didn’t have the right to be that person, but now he thinks it simply would _be_ right if he weren’t.

When he risks a look back to Harry, he sees him smiling to his surprise: a huge, toothy smile, dimples out. Louis never thought he’d be the person for whom that smile is for again.  
  
He opens his arms, and Louis walks to him, unsure, but he meets his chest, and he buries his head there, and it feels so much like _home_ that Louis can’t stop the few tears that escape him, and Harry chuckles, though he sounds affected too, reaching up to wipe his eyes.

“I’ve waited so long to hear you say that,” Harry says. “You remember when I told you that I couldn’t see myself _with_ anyone? Not like, ever in a romantic sense. Well, I do with you. I really do, and I couldn’t stop thinking that all winter break. You mean something to me, and like, that scared me, and I didn’t know how to express it. Because it was so different from anything I’ve ever had with girls, like every touch meant something, and I knew I had to stay away, but it was fucking agony seeing you with someone else. And like, I feel guilty, because I reckon he would’ve been perfect for you, and I feel like I’ve corrupted you or summat, but…” he lets out a shaky breath that catches on a dry sob, and he buries his face in Louis’ hair, like he’s ashamed of himself, like he can’t quite believe it himself. “‘Just had to have you, Lou. I can’t believe it’s over. I can’t believe I get to have you. Now it’s in my hands, I almost…”

“If you say you don’t want it, I’ll fecking twat you one,” Louis mumbles, and a laugh rumbles in Harry’s chest.

“You kidding? I’m never letting you go. Now I’ve got you… and like you’re not going anywhere, I can see myself like this forever. I missed you, I waited everyday for you to text me, literally,” and Louis could almost laugh at how stupid he’d been, because so had he waited.  

Louis grips him tighter, leaning back to look into his eyes, sniffling. Harry’s eyes are wet, looking so, so green and light, so open. He smiles down at Louis, running a hand through Louis’ fringe.

“I missed you, too, Haz. It fucking sucked, not having you there, in any way I could.” He rests his face in Harry’s chest again, breathing in the smell of his hoodie, his warmth, his beauty. They hug from side to side, exhausted from the cathartic conversation they just had.

“Come to my room with me,” Harry said by way of reply, echoing Louis’ request before the half term. This time, Louis took Harry’s hand, and together they walked, knowing with certainty that this time, they would be okay.

They’re lying on Harry’s bed on a Saturday, Louis having just come back from his final class of the evening. Louis is not ashamed to say he near ran home after receiving a text from Harry saying he’d skipped his Criminal Law seminar.  
  
Harry’s room slightly bigger than Louis’, the lucky fuck. His bedding is plush; black with silver thread piping, and he’s managed to make his small dorm room in Richmond Halls look rather mode, with small bonsai plants dotted about, a tiny cactus on the window sill, and the poem _If_ by Rudyard Kipling is framed and perched on one of the beech shelves. A lime green air freshener is plugged in somewhere, exuding a fresh, fruit smell that makes Louis notice it every time he walks in, random posters of rugged-haired bands on his wardrobe door. It’s every much as pretentious as Louis thought it would be, but it feels overwhelmingly like _Harry_. It feels like peeking into the inside of Harry’s head, with all the pictures of his family and friends from home, his prom picture, some birthday cards he’s saved from over the years that meant a lot to him. Louis is just so grateful to be there, to not be the other side of the wall, to be in Harry’s strong arms with this beautiful kid looking at him like he’s stolen the moon for him or something.  
  
Harry leans down and kisses him, his arm that was underneath him raising to bring Louis in closer, tighter. Louis’ hands go to his face, feeling the warmth there, the boy there, with his beating heart and irregular breaths and eagerness to push further, but also he can sense the man there: inhaling his Ralph Lauren aftershave, the stubble on his jaw and lip, the firmness of his arms and chest.

“Fuck, I’ve missed you,” Harry breathes, and Louis’ stomach _plummets_ because he can’t believe he gets to see this side of Harry; emotional, loving, caring. He’d seen the other sides, were well acquainted with his dorky side, his clever side, his sexy side, his adventurous side, his annoying side… he thinks this side of him is the most beautiful of all. He giggles as Harry buries his head into Louis’ neck, kissing him, marking him because he knows he finally can.

“I missed you too,” he breathes, stroking up and down Harry’s back, feeling the tightness of his abs as he pushes forward, surges to reconnect their lips.

They kiss for a while after that, and it’s so new that Louis just can’t quite believe it’s still happening. He wishes, _wishes_ , that he had done this sooner, kissed this beautiful boy sooner, because then he wouldn’t have all those months of total agony, listening to Harry with other people. He never wanted to hear that again, or see it again, or think about it again. Louis wants to keep Harry here forever, fuck degrees, fuck grades, just have Harry kissing him like he is now; half his body laying on top of him, the feel of his hard dick on his leg but both ignoring it, and Louis thinks _I did that, he really wants me, it’s me doing that._

Harry pushes for it to be more, because they’d only really explored kissing to this point and once Harry had put his mouth on Louis. Louis has not wanted to go too far, was always kind of triggered by being the culprit of the sounds that Louis so previously hated. It’s not exactly chaste kissing, however, as much as you would expect from Harry, because his hands are never still, not for a moment, always moving from his hair to his face to the bit just above his pants, to his bum, and back up, on a totally different route from the one he came.

To be honest, Louis is still in awe that someone like Harry is even looking at him, so close like this, so he can smell his toothpaste and all that creepy shit that he really needs to stop thinking, but fucking hell, even his _eyebrows are incredible_ and then Louis knows things have gone too far.  

Harry rolls Louis onto his back, climbing onto him to pin him to the bed. As he explores Louis’ mouth for the hundredth time that week with his tongue, his hands get to work on his own belt, exposing himself and Louis sneaks down to get a glance.

“Fucking hell, Haz,” Louis says, a bit dry mouthed. “It’s no wonder you made so much noise in here, how could anyone keep quiet with _that_ thing in ‘em?” Harry is, not untrue to his height, very well hung, and he looks entirely confident in it, like he wants to show it off, and Louis has to get his mouth on it before he dies. Harry dives down, running his tongue up a stripe above his navel. Louis’ legs kick out, and Harry pins them both down, preventing him from just thrusting up.  
  
“Wait, what?” Harry asks, kissing down his torso, licking the happy trail down to his dick. Fuck, Louis doesn’t want to talk right now, and tries to push Harry down again. Harry grabs his wrists instead.  
  
“You… could hear me?” He says, looking amused.

“Yes, you spork. _Everything_.”

“What, everything? I always imagined it wasn’t too bad. I guess you get kind of lost in your own thoughts, don’t you? Sorry...” he says, looking genuinely a bit worried. Louis wants to thrust himself into Harry’s mouth in the next ten seconds, or he might die.

“Don’t be,” Louis gasped, as Harry massaged his dick through his jeans. “It was some great wanking material,” he says, head back and moaning.

Harry’s eyes light up in interest. “ _Fuck_ that’s hot. Mm, Lou, fuck. You dirty then, huh? You’re a dirty boy who touched himself listening to me fucking someone else?” and at this point Louis doesn’t even think that Harry knows what he’s saying sounds like its from a bad porno, but Louis can accept it because he’s being touched, just pants a “ _Yeah, fuck, yeah_ ” because Harry is _way_ out of his league and literally plucked from his dreams, and saying it makes Harry get rougher and Louis is so down for rough.

“Fuck, I thought about you so many times, Louis. You know that? Thought about that incredible arse and mouth. Love this arse.” he slaps it, to get the point across. Louis whines more, and then Harry takes him all in. The sight is unimaginable.    
  
Louis thinks he may have died because only then could he be experiencing something so ethereally amazing in his whole life.

Louis lets him pin him down after, kissing up his neck and down his back, until he opens him ready. When Harry pushes in, he and Louis both lose their breaths. Louis can feel Harry rest his head against the back on Louis’ shoulders, the front of his hair wet with sweat. He thrusts, muffling Louis’ _shhh_ ing with his palm as he fucks into him faster, headboard banging relentlessly against the wall, the sound of his thighs slapping his arse a liturgy which accompanies the creaking of the mattress.  
  
“Wanna hear you, be loud for me,” Harry demands, and fucking hell, he loves the sound of his own voice. Still, Louis unleashes sounds which he’s always been too embarrassed to make, though when he does, it makes Harry bite into Louis’ shoulder and release a gutteral, feral sounding moan, which turns Louis on inexplicably so, so he just keeps on making the sounds, seeing stars behind his eyes.

Louis is sure people can hear them, as they’re definitely being louder than anything Louis had heard when he was the eavesdropping listener, but Harry fucks like he's on a mission, rough and needy. He puts his arm round the front of Louis’ chest, palm on his chin and tilting it back so the line of his neck is exposed, forcing his arse further up as his back arches, Harry's fingers lodged into Louis' mouth.

“Harry, you gotta come babe, I’m not gonna last,” he moans into the air. So Harry does, fucking Louis with such fervour that Louis thinks he will never, ever be able to leave this bed, knowing that Harry is capable of using himself like that. Looking back at Harry as he rides it out, his eyes closed like it's only himself in the room, like Louis is his to take, his eyebrows furrowed, his nails digging into Louis' hip until it's painful and bruising, Louis thinks  _I get it_. 

  
  
Two days later, before pres is due to start and they steal a moment alone in the kitchen cooking egg fried rice and stir-fry noodles, Alice and Jade suddenly come into the kitchen, towing a load of Tesco bags full of shopping with them. They both drop what they're carrying, spotting Harry and Louis kissing whilst Harry is absent-mindedly stirring the hoisin sauce.

They both scream, causing Louis and Harry to break apart, Harry’s face an absolute prize as his wide eyes scan the room for the source of the noise. The girls are still screaming, slapping each other’s shoulders, giggling hysterically, but Jade is now actually crying. Alex rushes in, as does Niall, then Henry and Liam with their laptops in their hands.

“What the fuck is all the shouting about?!” asks Niall, himself shouting too, “I t’ought something was on fucking _fire!_ ”

Alice has grabbed his hoodie, shaking him back and forth, and Niall looks at her like she’s spouted three heads. “Alice, love, what’s wrong?” Alice looks at Harry, then and Louis, as if to say _well, can I?_  
  
Louis just looks at Harry, who just nods, laughing, putting his face into his hands and groaning, knowing that this is going cause a fucking huge commotion. Louis laughs with him.

“We came in and these two were necking each other like bloody _teenagers_.”

“I am a teenager,” Harry says, offended, like that was the point all along. Everyone ignores him.

“And last night,” Alice interjects, but breaks down laughing before she can start again. “Oh my gosh, last night Jade, Louise and I heard these noises from Harry’s room…” everyone retches, knowing well enough just how loud Harry can be, everyone being a victim of a bad night’s sleep or bad exam because of it. “Well we heard it yesterday, like _really_ going at it, like we thought Harry must have a new girl who’s damn _dirty_ , and now we realise…!” she says, bending down and laughing. “We _realise_ it’s Louis! It’s been Louis!”

The flat look between Harry and Louis, expressions ranging from clueless, to proud, to bored.

“Yeah mate, we all saw it coming. Glad for you boys, but I am pissed that we had to put Love Island on hold for so long when all you were doing was fucking. Episode six is only on ITV for another three days,” Alex says, genuinely irked, and Louis is so damn well relieved that these are his friends, and this is their reaction, that he actually reaches over and hugs Alex, who rubs his back, a bit startled. Bless his hetero-normative ways.

They _do_ settle down for the catch up of Love Island episode in the kitchen, Louis dragging his duvet in to share with Harry, wrapping around the two chairs they rest on, Louis’ legs sprawled over Harry’s, talking to Louise about their upcoming Shakespeare presentation they’ve got coming up. Harry drapes his arm around him, chest radiating warmth, playing QuizUp on his phone. Alex gets the laptop ready, resting it precariously in its usual place on the beige painted radiator on the kitchen wall. Alice is sitting on the floor with her back to the fridge, knees tucked into her chest as Niall nuzzles into her side. He’s chatting to Liam about the football match today and Harry tells them to shut it, which earns him Niall's slipper being thrown at his arm.  
  
"I'll get yer head next time, you fuck," Niall threatens and Harry looks outraged, which makes Louis burst out laughing at the sight of. He just cannot believe he's his. The noise is added to by Jade, who is hitting Henry because he’s not passing the Doritos and Louis is just…

He's happy.

That’s the thing, he’s happier than he’s ever been. The strong arm around him, reminding him that he will be going bed with him tonight, and it never has to end. Louis is happy, hundreds of miles from home, with eight other very special people, in Flat 28, Richmond Halls, University of Surrey.


End file.
